Welcome to Woodland Treasures
"Adornment in wood"
"Woodland Treasures" is a range of high quality wooden jewellery and combs lovingly hand carved in the Highlands of Scotland by me, Geoff King.
I have been designing and making hand carved wooden jewellery since November 2003, using mostly salvaged or recycled British hardwoods. For more detail see Biography.
My work continually evolves, so the collection includes over one hundred designs of earrings, brooches, kilt pins, necklaces, combs bangles (bracelets) and pendants. All work is fret sawn to shape and then individually carved by hand using super sharp knives and needle files. Finally, each piece is brought to a fine finish and treated with natural, solvent-free plant oils to protect the surface and enhance the grain and colour.
My inspiration comes mostly from the natural world and its many forms. I find myself both moved and inspired by my love of nature, trees and wood, the richness of the colours, textures and patterns in the grain. I am also influenced by art nouveau, mythology and Celtic/Pictish designs.
I am happy to undertake commissions for special one-off pieces, designed and crafted according to your personal wishes.
Geoff King
Environmental, ethical, and fairtrade.
Re-using, Recycling, Re-inventing, Re-creating...
I feel a great reverence for and deep connection to nature. I have a particular affinity with trees and respect them greatly, so I take care in how I use them.
My wife and I care passionately about my jewellery and the world we live in, so the quality of workmanship is high and I attempt to keep any undue impact on the environment as low as possible. Also see “About us”.
The jewellery is all carved from small pieces of salvaged, recycled, storm-felled and local British hard woods – never new tropical timbers. We coppice hazel from trees we have planted and make use of old piano keys, wood from tree surgeons and off-cuts from furniture- and musical instrument-makers. There is very little waste in the workshop, whether it is in materials used or through choice of tools, electrical equipment and suppliers.
All paper and card products used for letters and packaging is re-cycled and in addition the boxes selected are strong enough and nice enough to re-use.
A lot of hand tools are used and high quality ones are bought, well cared for and therefore they do not need to be replaced.
By working from home and selling more through a website I am aiming to reduce miles travelled.
The workshop is small and well insulated thus reducing energy. Our light bulbs at home, in the workshop and on the stall are low energy, plus whenever we are at outdoor events in our own canves marquee we have LED lighting for the evenings, powered by a solar rechargeable battery system which works well even in the north of Scotland!
All work is finished with a blend of Tung nut oil and Ecowood oil. These products use only natural ingredients - there are no petrochemicals or solvents in them.
I am aiming to earn a fair living wage as a skilled craftsman producing high quality work in the UK.
Silver findings (e.g. ear wires and brooch pins) when used are standard in the industry and as yet we do not know of any fairly traded options. However, using the Internet we are keeping up with developments and look forward to new opportunities arising. Meanwhile we are gradually reducing the amount of metal used, for example with the new wooden toggle & loop necklace/pendant fitting, the two-bead adjustable string and a wooden bead instead of wound-wire or silver crimps as cord trims.
I am starting to incorporate more local stones in the jewellery. For example Scottish marble direct from the collector and self-gathered river & beach stones. We are also searching for ethically traded semi-precious stones. For all materials, where we can we source locally, in Scotland first, then UK. However, there are some products that still come a long way but we are always looking to find them fairtrade and nearer to home.