Peter Waals

Trained as a cabinet maker in his native Netherlands, Waals spent three years working in Brussels, Berlin and Vienna before moving to London where he was introduced to Ernest Gimson in 1901.

[1] Gimson had set up a small workshop in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, and then at Daneway House at Sapperton, making furniture, turned chairs, and metalwork to his own designs.

The cover of the font, which lifts and descends by means of a counterbalance in the roof space, was carved by one of Waals' craftsmen, Owen Scrubey.

From 1920 to 1937 the workshop produced high quality furniture to Waals' and Jewson's designs and also trained apprentices in the Arts and Crafts tradition.

There, Waals instructed students in the approach and high standards of craftsmanship required in the making of furniture that had been established by Ernest Gimson and the Barnsley brothers in Sapperton.