“Without question, every furniture college in the country needs strong links with industry,” says Josh Hudson, Furniture Lead at Rycotewood.
An award-winning provider of vocational training in furniture design and making, Rycotewood has built a reputation as one of the UK’s leading names in woodworking education thanks to nearly nine decades of experience and deep-rooted industry partnerships.
For the college, collaboration with industry isn’t an added extra – it’s central to how students are prepared for real-world careers. That philosophy has shaped its latest partnership with Swiss fixing specialist, Lamello. Marking the first project the two have worked on together, the collaboration sets the tone for a constructive, longlasting relationship, giving students valuable exposure to the skills, tools, and thinking they’ll need in industry.
“With the support of partners like Lamello, our students are exposed to a wide range of materials and processes that are essential to their development,” says Hudson. “It keeps our courses fresh, relevant, and closely aligned with the realities of industry.”
This shared commitment has helped shape the curriculum, with the first joint project now nearing completion. The brief challenges second-year Furniture Design students to create a carcass using Lamello’s Clamex fittings on the Zeta P2, combined with Shinokki – a pre-finished, real wood veneer bonded to am MDF panel, supplied by James Latham. From there, students are encouraged to develop bespoke, one-off pieces that build on the original design.
“We want them to push creative boundaries and explore the full potential of Lamello’s fixings – even testing them in ways they may not have been originally intended for,” says Hudson. “In a way, we’re challenging the students to fail, learn from that failure and then develop their ideas further. In industry, you don’t generally have the opportunity to do this.”
Lamello has played an active role from the outset, with UK Sales Manager Shaye Chatfield visiting the college to introduce the company and demonstrate its fixing solutions. “The visits have really captured the students’ interest and ours too for that matter,” says Hudson. “After learning about the wider Lamello portfolio, a number of students have chosen to incorporate different fixings into their designs. Tenso and Divario fixings have been particularly popular because of their time-saving benefits and invisibility.
"We’ve also seen more questions being asked and designs evolving, which is exactly the outcome we hoped for from Lamello’s involvement.”
The impact of this ethos is already being felt. At Rycotewood’s shows, it’s companies competing for students, not the other way around. Thanks to the experience gained through industry partnerships, students are entering the job market confident, capable and in demand.
The students’ finished projects will be on display at Rycotewood’s end-of-year show this June at the college’s Oxford-based Furniture Centre.
