The flame-veneer headboard
The veneer was lifting along the edges, and in places it had gone altogether. Craig relaid it and polished the whole board, so the flame figure and the rope moulding read clearly again.
It was your granny’s table. It can be your grandchildren’s.
Craig Williams repairs, restores and French polishes family furniture in his workshop at Bankfoot, just north of Perth.
He reweaves cane, rush and cord seats and makes new pieces to order. The easiest way to start is to text him a photo.
A twin pedestal D-end table in its own dining room: on dust sheets before the work began, then polished to a deep, even shine with its chairs back round it by the fire.
Most of what comes in is family furniture
A table dropped by the removal men. Chairs marked after water got to them. A nursery chair with the cane gone through. These pieces matter because of who sat at them, and Craig treats them that way.
He recovered and restored a loved piece of family history.
Review on Yell, about an oak dining table broken in a house move
My Uncle Charles’ nursery chair was in a sad state. Scruffy, loose inlay and a seat that needed re-caning big-time.
Review on Yell
He restored the table and chairs to beyond my expectations.
Review on Yell
Rated 5.0 from 10 reviews on Yell (archived June 2025).
What Craig does
- Repair and restoration
All types of furniture, old and modern: lifting veneer, split tops, broken joints, chips, marks and tired finishes.
- French polishing
Traditional French polishing and modern finishes, from a wee tea table to the dining table the whole family sits round.
- Chair seating
Chair caning, bergère, rush and cord seats, woven by hand.
- Furniture making and cabinetry
Tables, benches, beds and fitted shelving, made to order in the Bankfoot workshop.
Two more that went home looking right again
The Orkney chair
Its tall straw back was still sound, but the seat had worn right through. The back stayed, and Craig wove a new rush seat.
Send Craig a photo by text
You don’t need to know what’s wrong with it or what it’s made of.
A few photos from your phone tell Craig most of what he needs. Add your name and roughly where you are, and he’ll come back to you with what he thinks.
What to photograph
- The whole piece, standing on the floor
- The damage, close up
- Underneath the seat or the top, if you can
- Any maker’s label or stamp
From a workshop in Bankfoot
Bankfoot sits on the old A9 between Perth and Dunkeld. Craig has customers from Perth, Dunkeld and Birnam, Blairgowrie, Pitlochry, Crieff and the villages in between.
Perth had more than six hundred wrights at work between 1700 and 1840. Craig keeps the same trade going, a few miles up the road.