THE NEW English MASTERS

From potters to carpet weavers, EIGHT ARTISAN-LED STUDIOS forging an innovative new class of British craftsmanship

- TRACEY MINKIN

ANTIQUE REPRODUCTIONS

JAMB

It's near impossible to tell the old from the new at Jamb, the sublime gallery on Pimlico Road by Will and Charlotte Fisher. And that's by design. The pair have combined their backgrounds (his largely in antiques, hers in fabrics) since the early 2000s to expand Will's antiques business into an impressive collection of 17th-, 18th-, and 19th-century designs-seating, tables, mirrors, lighting, and famously fireplaces-that evoke (and could fill) the idealized English country house. Pristine new designs are the product of a cadre of British artisans and international specialists. The ideal, Will says, is to create pieces that mine their antecedents' DNA so artfully that they slip into rooms of antiques unnoticed: a sleepy piece, he jokes. "One that looks like it's grown roots."

FURNITURE, LIGHTING, FABRICS

SOANE BRITAIN

"Working with artisans in Britain has been at the heart of our vision since the very beginning, from printers and upholsterers to coppersmiths and ceramicists," says Lulu Lytle (below), who founded her company in 1997 with Christopher Hodsoll. That sums up to relationships with 39 independent craft workshops in the U.K. And the collaborations continue: This fall Soane Britain releases a new four-fabric line with decorator Adam Bray, while its new flagship showroom on Madison Avenue puts those relationships on radiant display. "Our workshops owe a great deal to U.S. clients who really understand the importance of resuscitating endangered craft skills," Lytle says.