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Laura Ashley has moved outdoors - and into the garden. This is an ideal marriage, the beauty of high quality garden furniture combined with classic timeless Laura Ashley fabric design. As you would imagine, Laura Ashley products are created to a very high specification and are ethically produced. With all the talk of destruction of the rainforests, it is nice to see Laura Ashley take their environmental responsibilities extremely seriously "all teak used in Laura Ashley Garden Furniture is Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC) certified." Teak is used in many products and it is said that boat decking manufacturers use 20 times more teak than that used by the garden furniture industry. What is important is that all teak used in consumer products should come from managed plantations. The FSC organisation is completely independent of government interests, forest owner, or producer, unlike some other schemes such as Perum Perhutani, (run by the Indonesian Government), or Tropical Forestry Trust (TFT) (B&Q are founding members). The FSC organisation not only ensures that all the teak certified comes from managed environmentally sustainable plantations, but also that the workers in those plantations have access to proper healthcare, education and safety equipment. In addition, FSC certification ensures that governments are not able to over exploit their natural resource to their own financial ends; Burma (Myanmar) is a case in point, which is rich in teak, but has no FSC certified plantations. In fact John of Garden Furniture Scotland Ltd knows of only 2 countries in the world which have teak that satisfies the FSCs stringent requirements for certification. Good quality teak heart wood is the best wood for garden furniture bar none due to its high oleoresin content, which acts as a natural preservative. Be very wary of teak with light and dark areas in the same piece of timber as this is young, immature teak which has a tendency to warp. The most impressive product in the author's opinion is the stunning 6 seat table and chair set. The Chelsea Set is sourced from sustainable materials and is FSC certified. The Laura Ashley Chelsea FSC Teak Set is delightful and seats 6 people. The table extends from 132-180cm and cleverly has 2 leaf extensions. The design is great as it has an auto slide mechanism, which as one extends one side, so the other side opens as well. By having two extensions, either side of the central spar, the table is very flexible, and the parasol can be used in the centre of the table in whichever configuration you have it. The Laura Ashley Chelsea chairs have arms and fold flat for ease of movement and storage. Whilst this is great, the Chelsea Set really comes to life when one adds the Laura Ashley Lloyd design reversible seat pads, black with biscuit coloured design on one side, biscuit colour with black pattern on the other. The fabric colour against the natural tint of the teak just looks stunning. However, the icing on the cake is the Laura Ashley parasol. This is the only double skinned parasol this author has ever seen. The frame is made from FSC teak. The parasol canopy has an outer cover of Lloyd black with biscuit coloured design; the underside layer has biscuit coloured background with black design. This makes for a fantastic contrast, and the pattern and colours, just set off the rest of the furniture to make it simply stunning. Also in the range of Laura Ashley Garden Furniture supplied by Garden Furniture Scotland Ltd, is the Sandbanks deckchair. The frame is manufactured in the hardwood Balau and is carefully crafted to a high specification with some modern design improvements to the traditional original Edwardian deckchair. One of the major improvements is the new locking system for the 3 recline positions. The scourge of the deckchair consigned to history. The positive click lock can be operated by ones foot and ensures the deckchair cannot collapse when one is in it. The sunshade canopy is adjustable and can be moved up or down to protect ones face from the sun. The Lloyd fabric sun canopy is the reverse of the seat design which is dominated by the black coloured background with the classic Laura Ashley pattern in printed in biscuit. The footrest is easily removable and has a folding base support leg. It is a delightful and inexpensive classic piece of designer garden furniture. There are many other designs in the Laura Ashley Garden Furniture range, including traditional garden benches, to very modern aluminium and glass designs, all with Laura Ashley design and quality built in. |