Parker, Stanley

Letchworth, Hertfordshire; woodworker (fl.1895-d.1946)

Stanley Parker started working with wood as a schoolboy at Bedales School, 1894-95. He trained at Goodall’s Cabinet Works and the Manchester School of Art, and then returned to Bedales to teach. In 1897-98 Parker worked at the cabinet makers Simpson of Kendall. The following year he worked as an assistant to C. F. A. Voysey before returning to Bedales, this time to run its workshop.

In 1906 Parker married Signe Bergstrom, a Swedish physiotherapist who he had met in Buxton, where his brother Barry had an architectural practice. They moved to Letchworth, a new town founded in 1903, which initially attracted a large group of artists and craftspeople. He produced hand-made furniture to commission from a workshop adjoining his house throughout his time in Letchworth, often for local residents like Thomas and Mary Cockerell.

In 1923 Parker’s English oak and elm furniture was illustrated in the Studio Year Book of Decorative Art. He later became head of craft at the town’s progressive school, St Christopher’s. He died in 1946. Designs of a side cabinet and table are illus. The Decorative Arts Society (2017), p. 193.

Source: Allwood, ‘Innate Bohemians All: decorative artists in the early Garden City’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850 to the Present’ (2017).