A statement in Santos rosewood
Journal / Projects
ProjectA statement in Santos rosewood
A rosewood and brass shelving unit, designed, made and installed as the first thing you see in an open-plan family home.
Santos rosewood veneer, solid rosewood lippings and brass inlay, with concealed LED lighting.
In this Tivoli, Cheltenham home, the front door doesn't open onto a hallway. It opens straight into a generous open-plan lounge and kitchen, so whatever stands at the centre of that room is the first impression of the whole house. Our brief was to make that first impression count.
The brief
The clients wanted a single statement piece to anchor the space: something with real presence that would also work hard as everyday storage and display. It needed to feel warm and considered without taking over a room the family lives in every day.
We chose Santos rosewood for its depth of colour and figure, and paired it with fine brass detailing to lift the timber and catch the light.
Designing in the detail
The character of the piece comes from its geometry. Rather than running continuous edging around each shelf, the rosewood lippings were jointed in 30mm squares, with every square selected and aligned so the grain reads consistently across the whole unit.
Slender brass inlays trace the lines of the design along the edges. Each mitre was fitted and refined by hand until the joint was exact, because with brass against dark timber any gap, however small, shows.
The hardest part: one piece, built in two
At this scale the unit couldn't be made, moved or installed in one piece, so we built it in two sections in our workshop. That created the biggest challenge of the job: when the halves came together on site, the veneer, the rosewood squares and the brass inlay all had to carry across the join without a visible break.
Getting that right meant planning the split at the design stage, setting out both halves from the same reference points, and dry-fitting in the workshop before anything left the bench. On site, the join disappeared. The brass runs continuously and the rosewood reads as one surface.
Lighting and installation
Once the unit was fitted, concealed LED lighting was added by an electrician working alongside us. It gives the brass and timber a soft glow that changes through the day, from a subtle warmth in daylight to a real focal point in the evening.
The result
For all its bold material and detail, the unit doesn't dominate. It sits comfortably within the open-plan layout, as if the architecture had been waiting for it, and it sets the tone for the rest of the house.
If you're thinking about a statement piece of your own, whether shelving, a media wall or a full run of fitted cabinetry, we'd love to hear about it. Tell us about your project, see what we make, or browse more of our work.
Got a space in mind?
Tell us about it and we'll come back to you personally within two working days. Based in Winchcombe, working across the Cotswolds, London and the rest of the UK.