An Arts & Crafts Yorkshire School English Oak dining table by Don Foxman Craven (Ex-Mouseman) made in about 1970. An excellent 6 foot table in the classic Yorkshire School tradition. Featuring:

• Very well figured quarter-sawn English Oak (quarter-sawing is a method of sawing oak logs to produce boards with superior strength making it less likely to crack shrink or warp. It also gives the finished boards prominent highly decorative 'medullary rays' in its grain.)

• Rectangular top made out of just three continuous pieces of very well figured quarter-sawn solid timber with button screwed fixing

• On shaped trestle supports with sledge feet joined with a single stretcher secured by keyed tenons

• Subtly adzed (the subtle surface rippling synonymous with Yorkshire School furniture)

Approximate dimensions are:

• Overall Depth 840mm (2 feet 9 inches)

• Overall Length 1830mm (6 feet)

• Overall Height 740mm (2 feet 5 inches) [A standard height for a dining table]

• Top Thickness 45mm ( 1 3/4 inch)

c. 1970

Don Craven's finely carved bushy tailed sitting fox motif

Very good sound condition with tight joints, good colour and clean finish. If you wish to have further specific photographs or talk to us for a more detailed condition report then please do not hesitate to contact us.

A former Robert 'Mouseman' Thompson craftsman (and the original "Foxman", prior to Malcolm Pipes using a fox's face) who set up his own workshop at Aldborough, near Boroughbridge, continuing to make high quality oak furniture in the Yorkshire School tradition until 1976. His work is signed with his carved seated fox motif

The most British of woods, that can produce really special results. English oak has been used for hundreds of years to construct everything from sea-going vessels to fine furniture. Although oak grows widely across Europe and North America, craftsmen continue to cherish English oak which grows more slowly than its foreign counterparts giving it strength, durability. Quarter sawn boards are very straight grained and have distinctive growth rings and medullary rays that give a very beautiful effect as well as being renowned for their superior stability and strength

The Yorkshire School of the Arts & Crafts movement started with Robert 'Mouseman' Thompson's  transformation from jobbing carpenter to master craftsmen. By the mid-1920s he had adopted his trademark mouse (now world renowned as a symbol of quality furniture) and had his own workshop busily employing several men. As the workshop grew and over the years many of the craftsmen have taken their skills and branched out and adopted a trademark of their own, a fox, a lizard, a fish, a rabbit to name but a few, and whilst some have closely stuck to the Mouseman designs others have taken the style and adapted it. Other craftsmen, unconnected to the Mouseman workshop, have also chosen the classic Yorkshire Oak style as their own. Typical Yorkshire school items are in English Oak, with traditional pegged joints and adzed surfaces