Robert George always works with timber sourced from his own carefully considered arboricultural practices and sustainable small-scale forestry operations, all from within a 30mile radius of his workshop in rural Northamptonshire. Provenance is at the heart of every piece he makes and this is especially true of two of the larch boules we are showcasing for Collect.

A few years ago Robert removed major deadwood from the crown of a mature larch from his childhood, this work is done not only from a public health and safety perspective but also allows you to monitor the condition of the tree by whether or not new deadwood is occurring and at what rate the tree is in decline. It's part of good forestry.

Robert devoted a lot of time and energy trying to preserve this tree, often against the will of some local parishioners and a fairly damning tree report, but it was felled in the end, not by him but by a friend who kindly let him take a couple of sections of the stem. These were left until last January before being processed in the early summer and later lathe turned and hand carved to form two incredibly warm and tactile boule shaped pots ready for Collect.