Older news stories and events from 2001 are shown below. News from other archived years are in our news archive section. News stories and reports from this year are viewable in the Latest News section.

2001

21^st Anniversary of BAFRA

A Georgian workshop marked an historic event

The British Antique Furniture Restorers' Association marked their 21st anniversary - by going back to the 18th century.

The association featured a Georgian workshop at the Olympia Spring Fine Art and Antiques Fair.

To mark BAFRA's anniversary they formally launched a new form of membership for 'Friends of BAFRA', an initiative which has come from the many people and bodies who have supported the organisation over many years.

2001

The BAFRA Furniture Report

BAFRA Certified furniture

For some years BAFRA has been under pressure to introduce a form of report for every piece of quality antique furniture which undergoes conservation and restoration at the hands of a BAFRA member. Originally the purpose of this proposal was:

"To provide a written record of past and present conservation and restoration work which would remain with the furniture for evermore."

More recently and under some pressure it was decided that the report should:

"Provide a full and, as far as possible, irrefutable description of the furniture but with no mention of either value or ownership, although previous ownership as a valuable part of the furniture's provenance would be included."

An all important principle would be that the BAFRA Report should stay with the furniture for evermore. It is envisaged that in times to come, every piece of quality furniture will be provided with a report.

The rationale behind these decisions is that the experienced conservator/restorer is the best person to provide the necessary information and that he/she would do so unrelated to the value of the piece. It is BAFRA's view and the view of all who seek to protect the nation's cultural heritage that the BAFRA Report will go some way towards meeting that ideal ands also to meeting the concerns of the buying public.

An additional aspect of the BAFRA Report is that it will provide the necessary "Passport" for the assistance of tracking stolen items of furniture. The effectiveness of any search depends heavily on the fullness and accuracy of the description fed into the tracking system at the start of a search. This aspect of the reporting system has the strong support of the Police and The Art Loss Register and would probably have the support of the insurance world as well. If successful, the report or passport could be applied to any part of the movable cultural heritage.

"Once the arrangements have been made to ensure the cast iron security and the documents have been given the widest possible recognition, the report - an ID for furniture", says chairman Michael Barrington, "will be available to any applicant from authorised BAFRA members." The authorised members will only be those who wish to take part in the scheme and who have been properly trained to write the BAFRA Report.

Further details will be announced in due course.