Makepeace Forestry

General information

English Woodlands Forestry & Timber are foresters, silviculturalists, sawyers and wood suppliers. We’re two separate teams of people working alongside each other. We live and breathe our work and we believe in trees and wood.

The English Woodlands Forestry team are tasked with caring for the future of our woodland environment on behalf of private clients. These highly skilled foresters sole aim is to realise the client’s vision and in doing so create and maintain healthy, diverse and, ideally, productive woodlands.

For EWF this means being in the woods at daybreak to make the most of daylight hours - that’s 4am in high summer! - ready to take on the next specified task that’s usually part of a bespoke 10 year woodland management programme. For foresters on the ground it could be rhododendron or bracken spraying and clearing to keep the invasive species at bay, especially if we have young or newly planted trees in place trying to get a roothold. For the forest managers it could be visiting with an existing client to walk over and discuss each, very unique, woodland. It could be to measure up parcels for harvesting or to plan for woodland creation. It’s a fact that there aren’t enough hours in the day to do all we want to do but we’re happy to be expanding our forestry team to be able to take on more woodland work as more forward looking clients see the future of our environment and the importance of their role as woodland stewards.

The English Woodlands Timber team think wood all day long. They convert and supply timber. Their work is to take the tree and give it a second life as wood, the most beautiful and sustainable material on the planet, on behalf of woodworkers who seek superb quality, sustainable and often homegrown, hardwoods for their work.

For EWT timber supply begins in the woods with the careful selection of well managed, good quality standing trees or round timber. Then comes milling, to convert from logs to sawn timber. For timber cladding, structural timber beams or landscaping this could be all that’s required but if the wood is to be for furniture making, joinery, cabinetry or flooring then we begin the slow (very slow at a year per inch!) careful drying process that is sticking, binding and stacking boules to air-dry and create stability before kilning which reduces moisture levels making wood suitable for use in interiors. The result is a wood yard packed full of beautiful wood, sorted, stacked and searchable online waiting for the architect, the designer, the furniture maker, the joiner, the turner or anyone that wants and needs wood.

We believe in trees and wood. We hope you do too!