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is Bark, comprising husband-and-wife team Jonathan Walter and Lakshmi Bhaskaran, offering their own interpretation on bespoke, British-made furniture and accessories.

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Words by Emily Martin

Who

Bark is a collaboration between husband and wife Jonathan Walter and Lakshmi Bhaskaran, who met while studying at the Rowden Atelier school of furniture making.

Benugos, BFI: Bark supplied dining chairs and its Acorn One Seater lounge chairs when the British Film Institute refurbished its lounge. ‘We are currently working with it on a new project to deliver a further 13 Acorn One Seater lounge chairs’, say Walter and Bhaskaran.

‘We offer a fresh take on bespoke, British-made furniture and accessories,’ says the duo of the Bude-based business. ‘Our mission is to create stunning, original designs, made by hand using traditional cabinet-making skills.’ Bark’s designs evoke a mid-century modern appeal and encompass the same characteristics as the studio’s founding principles: confidence in proportion, modesty in detail and simplicity of construction. Not only is Bark’s furniture being made to high standards, the wood it uses also comes from sustainable sources. ‘We expect our furniture to last generations,’ Bark says.

Kustom Armchair and Ottoman: The Kustom Ottoman was designed after the owner of the Senses super yacht asked the studio to design one to match its Kustom Armchair. ‘The owner now lives in California and the yacht can be rented for a mere $300k a week!’ Bark says.

Why

Having honed their crafts in creating one-off pieces for individual clients, Walter and Bhaskaran decided to join forces and established Bark Furniture in 2010. ‘We soon realised we appreciated a similar design aesthetic and thought it would be really interesting to collaborate on creating a new brand that would reflect our passion for 20th-century design.’ It launched the Acorn Collection at Clerkenwell.

Wahaca, Kentish town: ‘Another great client that came back to us after we worked with them on the opening of their restaurant in St Paul’s’, Bark says. Wahaca’s Kentish Town restaurant also features Bark’s popular Acorn Two Seater

Design Week in 2011 and then the following autumn started to work with Lane Crawford, which bought and shipped a number of products to its Hong Kong stores. ‘We are currently developing new designs that will launch during this year’s London Design Festival,’ Bark says. ‘We also now devote some of our time to training and mentoring students at the college where we studied, so it is nice to have come full circle in a way.’

Where
www.barkfurniture.com