Peter Goodwin
Expert in fine furniture who co-founded Woodland Heritage
PETER GOODWIN, who has died aged 74, was a cabinet maker and forester who, in 1994, co-founded the charity Woodland Heritage.
His family are said to have been involved in cabinet making from the 18th century, and between the wars his father Gordon established a successful furniture factory in Ipswich. Goodwin and his half brother Jeremy entered the family business in 1960 when Peter was 18. When their father retired, the brothers took over management of the firm.
At the time, they employed 120 skilled craftsmen who produced fine period furniture for wealthy clients, each piece built by a single craftsman using traditional methods, down to the painting and polishing of the finished article. Goodwin had a real love for the feel and appearance of the wood used and was responsible for finding the decorative and other timbers required.
This led to his interest in forestry and he purchased two oak woods in Essex to teach himself silviculture. He established a sawmill and searched England for rare trees to buy. In this way he gained an encyclopaedic knowledge of forests.
Goodwin founded the charity Woodland Heritage with his fellow furniture manufacturer Lewis Scott, with the aim of linking those who grow timber with the furniture trade and others who use it, and persuaded the Prince of Wales to become its patron. Goodwin felt that by connecting cabinet makers with foresters there should be an improvement in the management of woodland for both timber production and conservation of wildlife.
For more than 20 years, Woodland Heritage has provided sponsorship and education for people wishing to embark on a career in forestry and any of the professions which use timber.
Peter John Goodwin was born in Ipswich on October 10 1942 and attended Gresham’s School in Holt, Norfolk. After leaving school he joined the family business.
Walnut was a favourite timber. Once, on a trip to Venice, he discovered that the “forcola”, the curiously-shaped rowlock of the gondola, was fashioned from the wood, and tracked down the only surviving forcola maker in Venice, publishing a detailed account of the process in the 2015 issue of the Woodland Heritage annual journal of which he was the editor.
For many years he ran the East Anglian division of the Royal Forestry Society, and led RFS parties to visit forests on the Continent. In 2010 he was awarded the society’s Gold Medal.
In 2002, when the Forestry Commission withdrew funding from the development of a fertility control programme for the American grey squirrel, British woodland’s most destructive pest, Goodwin was instrumental in founding the European Squirrel Initiative which in turn led to the establishment of the Red Squirrel Survival Trust.
More recently, when French scientists propounded a novel form of silviculture designed to reduce the rotation of oak from 140 to 100 years, Goodwin arranged for the research to be translated. The richly-illustrated Oak: Fine Timber in 100 years has become the bible for progressive growers.
Meanwhile, when ancient oaks across eastern England were found to be dying, it was Goodwin who raised the alarm and found £2 million from the private sector to enable Forest Research to dedicate a team to identify the cause. With disease now threatening many tree species across Britain, foresters are being encouraged to broaden the mix of species they plant.
Goodwin sought to increase awareness of the Wild Service tree, which produces high-value furniture timber, but which has suffered neglect in Britain.
Peter Goodwin also collected Lowestoft porcelain and landscapes by East Anglian artists.
He is survived by his wife Sally and their four daughters.
Peter Goodwin, born October 10 1942, died March 18 2017