The home
of
Marquetry
top border
Keeping
the best
Standards

article title

Marquetry Society logo

MARQUETARIANS
A few words for 2023 from your President

Year after year, I continue to marvel at the diversity and quality of work produced by the members of The Marquetry Society. The marquetry pieces on show at the various craft fairs and mini exhibitions around the country and in particular at the main event, the Society’s annual exhibition, are a delight to see.

Having the task of photographing all the exhibits at the International Exhibition each year has given me the opportunity to become even more intimate with the pieces than most people get the chance to do.

I feel quite privileged and it gives me an opportunity to study, and dare I admit, steal ideas for making the best use of veneers in pictures and other objects.

We all learn from one another and, if getting to exhibitions to see marquetry in the flesh, so to speak , is not something you are able to do, our webmaster Alan will make sure you miss nothing, as all the marquetry pieces on show will be readily accessible on the web site.

Not just recent work as there are gems to be found in other galleries of work going back many years. So take a tip from me, have a long hard look at other people’s work and you will learn a lot.

When you look at the buttons on the home page of this site, you will soon realise that the picture galleries where you will find the photos that I have mentioned, is just a small part of what can be found here. I see the home page as a front door if you like, to a mansion house of marquetry rooms that are all a delight to explore.

So whether you are an existing member of the Society or just exploring because something has sparked off an interest in marquetry, stay a while and see what you can find.

We welcome new members and always have an ongoing generous membership offer. The button for that is right near the top – ‘How do I Join’.

Peter White Jan 2023 - President from 2017 to 2023. Enrico's message will appear shortly.

Enrico President
 
Enrico Maestranzi
our President from June 2023


MEMBERS OF THE MARQUETRY SOCIETY

A message for 2023 from your Chairman

This position to be appointed at a forthcoming Executive Committee meeting

   

A letter from your Minutes Secretary
A message of greeting from our genial Minutes Sec

Hello fellow members. 

At last I have got round to writing a piece for the Website to replace the letter from our last Secretary, Neil Micklewright.  I’m afraid I was not a member when Neil was in post so I can’t speak from my own experience but to all accounts and purposes, he did a very good job and our thanks must go to him for the time he spent on our behalf.

My own introduction to marquetry came when I visited a show put on by the Guild of Essex Craftsmen several years ago and was drawn to the marquetry display.  Having always liked the touch and feel of wooden objects, from old church pews to modern turned objects, I was fascinated by the skill that went into making pictures and applied pieces with marquetry. 

At the time I was heavily involved with the Girlguiding movement and co-ordinating the century celebrations for Essex so didn’t have enough time for taking on anything new but I went back to the show once that had been completed and was persuaded that ‘anyone can do it’.  I had my doubts about that but along I went to the Chelmsford Group meeting and found that within a short space of time, a reasonable result could be achieved.  I soon became hooked.


Hon Sec Janet

Janet Edwards
Our Minutes. Sec

I am also one of those people that can’t just join a club or group and that’s it – I have to get involved  - so it wasn’t long before I was helping at the 60th Anniversary International Exhibition at Ingatestone Hall and taking on the role of secretary at the group. In 2013 I was asked to take the minutes at the Society’s AGM at Stoke and before that meeting had ended I had been elected as your Hon. Secretary.  The role has been very interesting so far;  I take the minutes at the committee meetings and receive enquiries from members and non-members alike through the website.

For those people that practice marquetry but have not joined the Society, I would recommend that they do so.  The annual subscription is very reasonable and apart from being able to enter the exhibition each year, they will receive a quarterly magazine containing a wealth of useful information and many pictures of the exhibition entries, which is in full colour and delivered right to their door. 

They will also be able to enter the members’ area of this website where they will find a comprehensive library of copyright free images suitable for marquetry.  Very good value for the money.
Please keep in touch with your thoughts, enquiries and general news.  By sharing what we do through the magazine, we all feel a little less remote and part of something special.

Janet Edwards – Minutes Sec.

And now meet your Web Secretary

A message of welcome from our friendly Web Sec


Hello. My name is David Walker and I am the Secretary of the Redbridge Group in East London.

I am now officially the Web Secretary of the Marquetry Society since the 2012 AGM which was held after the National Exhibition at Ingatestone Hall. I say officially because for about two and a half years I have been answering queries that are sent to the web site from all over the world on behalf of the Society. I started answering these Emails to take some of the weight from Alan our web master who found difficulty in answering them in reasonable time due to his commitments in producing the Marquetarian and compiling updates for the Society and Redbridge Web sites.

He was getting overwhelmed by sheer weight of enquiries so I offered to do it on his behalf. He arranged for all such enquiries to come to our Society address using our 1 and 1 Web Mail arrangements. Since then I have been privileged to receive marquetry enquiries from USA, UK, Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Spain, Norway, Libya, Turkey, Russia, Australia, New Zealand just to name but a few
!
David Walker
David Walker
Our Web Secretary from
July 2012

Since I started doing this in October 2009 I have replied to around several thousand or more such enquiries. It’s something that I enjoy doing because it makes me think marquetry and often I find myself having to do some research before replying. My sources are the internet, current members more knowledgeable than myself, books by, Bill Lincoln, Alan Townsend and David Middleton, Silas Kopf to name a few and also past Marquetarian magazines which are a mine of information.

A lot of enquiries have been coming from the USA from ex Service personnel or their families asking to identify pictures made by Buchschmid and Greataux in Heidelberg, which they took home after serving in Germany or Iceland 40 or 50 years ago. In answering these ‘B & G’ enquiries with Alan we seem to have become the world’s leading experts on their work (only because we’ve not been able to find anyone else to assist us after the last member of the company had passed away!).

My own pedigree as far as marquetry is concerned started in 1981 at the Woodworker show at Wembley. I was on sick leave recovering from a broken leg received whilst on duty in the Metropolitan Police in London. It had improved to such an extent that I was able to get about on crutches and seeing an advert about the show decided to go along as I was interested in woodwork. Whilst there I happened upon a stall exhibiting marquetry being run by the Harrow Group and was pounced on by the one and only Charlie Good. As a result, I joined up there and then and have progressed through the ranks in a mediocre fashion until I reached the Premier Class.

Over the years I have gained quite a bit of knowledge and experience and am happy to share that with anyone who cares to contact us. If I can’t answer the enquiry I pass it to other members who I think can help. I work very closely with Alan our web master, who is doing a wonderful job creating, updating and producing the web sites and compiling the Marquetarian.

I am quite happy holding this post but have had to decline becoming Secretary of the Society, having been asked to consider it, because a lot of my time is taken up in leading a church and as secretary of the Redbridge Group as well as family commitments, which take me up to Scotland quite regularly. I am under instructions not to take any more administration work by ‘she who must be obeyed’!

I look forward, maybe, to corresponding with some of you via Email in the future.

David Walker, January 2023

 

..................................................................................................................

DVD OFFERS

Five Superb Special Offers!: Offer 1: The Publicity Dept of the Marquetry Society is now making available for purchase DVDs of our International Marquetry Exhibitions. These includes a 'tours' round the historic locations along with a gallery of all the award winning exhibits.

The DVD’s are a fantastic reference library of the very best examples from today's marquetry that you will be pleased to own.
The photography is all in high quality JPEG format and is available in a universal format.

The DVD’s are currently available at £10.00 each (UK) - USA members, please contact Ernest Mills. Other countries please contact Peter for a price.

Offer 2: We also have an excellent "Marquetry Techniques & Tips" DVD available at £10.00 (UK) & $20.00 (USA)

Offer 3: And another superb DVD "Geometric Marquetry The Easy Way" also available at £10.00 (UK) & $20.00 (USA)

Offer 4: And yet another superb DVD "Alan Townsend Presents" is also available at £10.00 (UK) & $20.00 (USA)

Offer 5: And a very special DVD "Artistic Considerations & Veneer Choice in Marquetry" is also available. Please contact Peter for prices.

Offer 6: And yet another superb DVD "Bricks, Walls, Tiles and Pebbles in Marquetry" is also available at £10.00 (UK) & $20.00 (USA)

To purchase a copy of either DVD please contact our Publicity Dept by simply e-mailing your requirements to: peter@marquetry.org - (or if using Windows Mail, Outlook Express, etc, click here: peter@marquetry.org )

USA members -
please order your DVD through our USA representative Mr Ernest Mills (contact details on our Marquetry Society page)

..................................................................................................................

For our Data Protection Policy please click this link: Our Data Protection Policy

..................................................................................................................

To contact the Marquetry Society Web Site please click this e-mail link: Web Site

..................................................................................................................

If you would like more details on The Marquetry Society, contact either: 

Our Minutes Secretary Janet at:

janet@marquetry.org


or click here to email our Admin Team

or type: info@marquetry.org

Our Membership Secretary Andrew at:

andrew@marquetry.org


or click here to email our Admin Team

or type: info@marquetry.org


PRINTABLE MEMBERSHIP FORMS:-


For a membership form you can print and then submit to our membership secretary, (please see box above)
Click here

For a USA and Canada membership form
Click here

.......................................................


You can now apply for membership and pay your subscription online at:

Online Form & Payment Selection Page

(You can also renew your membership & subscription online,
just select 'Renew Subs' on the above selection page)


Subscriptions
Note: online rates includes PayPal supplement

Location
To Join
Renewal
UK
£26. 00
£26. 00
Europe
£28. 00
£28. 00
Overseas
£31. 00
£31. 00

If you need a currency converter at the latest rates then click the very helpful link below

Membership of The Marquetry Society includes the quarterly journal with hints, tips, letters, designs and of course the prizewinners from the National. Membership also entitles you to enter the National competition.

Special bank arrangements for USA and Canada

After some months of negotiations with the United States IRS Department, we have been granted Tax Exemption as a "Non Profit Organisation" and can now run a bank account in the USA for American members to pay their dues through. Will all US members and citizens wishing to join the Marquetry Society, please send their forms and checks via;

Mr Ernie Mills, 14515 W Granite Valley Dr., #B407, Sun City West, AZ 85375

E-Mail: ernest@marquetry.org

All general enquiries should be sent via the Membership Secretary in the UK.

Copyright Information

Part 1: General Rules.

It is the policy of the Marquetry Society never to infringe any copyright holder's ownership rights in any way or form by knowingly displaying a copyright protected work on their web site, or in any of their publications, without the consent of the copyright holder.

If a copyright holder feels, however, that we may have compromised their position by inadvertently displaying a piece that may, or could, be viewed as possibly contravening their title of copyright over the work; would they please bring this to our attention by contacting us in the first instance via the e-mail links they will find on this web site.

We will then do our utmost to resolve the issue as quickly as possible, to the complete satisfaction of each party concerned. Any such item thus in dispute shall be removed from the web site while the infringement is being investigated and an appropriate notice shall be displayed in its place until the problem is amicably resolved.

Part 2: Our initial procedures to correctly attribute recognition to the originator of a design.

If any potentially displayable marquetry work gives us grounds to consider that it could (or may) possibly have been copied (in marquetry form) from the original work of another person or artist (in whatever form they had chosen to use) and it has not already been granted permission for use, then the following procedure will be applied by us.

Any works displayed on our website or in any of our publications which could (or may look like it has in our opinion) have potentially been copied in marquetry form and adapted to the marquetry format from a (or any) copyright holder's original work and, despite the marquetarian in question's best efforts to communicate with the said (or any) copyright holder in order to attain permission to reproduce the work in marquetry form, has failed to materialise a response from the (or any) copyright holder, be it that they are no longer contactable using standard procedures, we will do our utmost to attribute appropriately the correct information regarding the original artist or designer (in any form) to the marquetry work in question.

Either of the following wordings will be added to the text accompanying the work in question until the (or any) copyright holder contacts us with whatever appropriate wording they would prefer us to use ('unknown' in these two wordings being a holder word pending communication from the original artist or their representative).

  1. After the work of 'unknown'
  2. Attributed to 'unknown'

This aforementioned procedure will in no way affect the copyright holder's right (as explained in section 1 of these rules above) to request us to remove any work which is in dispute from our website and replace it with appropriate text to explain why the removal has taken place. We are always most happy to comply with a copyright holder's requests on any of our displayed marquetry works which they feel is in dispute regarding their original work.

Part 3: Definition of our exhibits as applied to copyright status.

None of the marquetry works displayed in our exhibition galleries are, or were ever intended to be produced or reproduced for commercial purposes or for profitable gain in any way whatsoever.

Each and every exhibit is hand crafted in the marquetry medium of wood veneers and is intended to be seen and displayed as each respective marquetarian’s interpretation (in the medium of marquetry) of a given or chosen subject as selected by the aforesaid marquetarian.

Every marquetry work displayed in our galleries is produced as a ‘one off’ and is intended to be ultimately retained in its creator’s own personal collection (‘one off’ in this description being a singular piece of work which is not profitably reproducible by commercially viable methods)

Each and every marquetry piece displayed in our galleries will have been made as a labour of love for our marquetry craft and not in any way intended for purposes of a commercial nature. Our exhibition and competition rules forbid the entry of commercial marquetry pieces.

The design chosen by each respective marquetarian will have been chosen as their humble interpretation of a chosen and favoured design to be crafted in the medium of marquetry.

No commercial or profitable or multiple reproductions in marquetry of any design will ever be knowingly displayed in our galleries. If ever such an exhibit was found to have been displayed in any of our galleries, despite our rigorous checks to avoid such things, and this was subsequently brought to our attention, we would immediately (within practical limitations) upon being contacted, remove the offending piece from display on our website and a suitable apology would be displayed in its place.

The Marquetry Society recognises and places great value on respecting copyright holders rights regarding their own work. We will not knowingly set out to cause any dispute and will do all we can to resolve any such issues as quickly as possible to everyone's satisfaction.



Web Site Settings

This web site has been optimised for viewing at 1280 x 800 pixel screen resolution. Other resolutions may expand or contract the content of the pages that you view on screen, however, the layout and general appearance should remain consistent.

The web site has also been optimised for maximum compatibility with the web browser Internet Explorer (using the 'Compatibility View' setting in the very latest versions). It will also operate quite satisfactorily with other popular browsers such as Mozilla Firefox, Safari, etc, but some of its functionality may be slightly compromised, such as "pop up comments" and unintended border color effects and/or dimensions. But, basically, it should still prove satisfactory in any browser. Please let us know if you experience any other problems with this site in the particular browser that you favor.


Return to the News Page | Go to Roll of Honour Menu Page

Go to Home Page
Go to the Clubs and Groups directory page
Go to the International Galleries directory page
Go to the Marquetry Society official messages page
Go to the National Exhibition Winners Gallery page
Go to the Millennium Mural exhibition page