On your bike & mind the local sheep !

Ey up my faithful blogworms, You can't have helped notice that "Le Tour Yorkshire", the Yorkshire leg of the Tour De France has been in the news recently as the 100 days countdown has started

As you will see from the map, the Tour hits Ilkley on the Saturday 5th July and goes straight past our showroom front window on the main A65 trunk road.

Le Tour is the biggest major event to hit Ilkley in " I don't know how long". Certainly nothing this big in my living memory and I'll lived around here all my life.

Ilkley is one of the Tour 'hubs' so everything you could want to see will be going on in and around town, that's going to make it murder to move around by car for the whole weekend but then one of the purposes is to promote people moving around by bike or on foot as it's better for you anyway!!


As we're slap bang on the main road, we will be open all day on the Saturday and are welcoming our valued existing customers to join us in the showroom for the perfect vantage point. We will have unlimited free tea and coffee on all day, toilet facilities, and a place to shelter & sit down if the weather's inclement and you want to rest your weary legs.

We are also proposing to have small commemorative "Recycled Roadstone Plaques" to celebrate the event available for sale both before and on the day for a reasonable cost. Numbers of these will be limited so fans of the plaques, this is a one off opportunity, so don't miss out !!

(More details of size, format and cost of  these in the near future)

If you want to book a 'Roadstone Plaque' before the event, do let me know and we can make sure you get one. In fact, if you want to take advantage of our viewing point, it would be good if you let me know anyway as we only have so much space and if we can limit the numbers then we'll all have enough space to enjoy the day without getting squashed. Unlike our local sheep !!


You can contact me through our website or on: julian@milestone.uk.net to book your place at, probably, the only venue on the day where it costs you nowt to be here and not be crushed in the crowds !!

Supporting Le Tour and helping our valued customers enjoy it .... What a Public Service from those extremely nice people at Milestone Design !!

Your interests at heart ..... Jules 

"Which" Pan

Ey up my faithful blogworms, my apologies for leaving you with nothing to read last week but eco duty called down in sunny Essex so I didn't get chance to spout forth words of wisdom last week. Hopefully this weeks will make up for it

I bring you further news from a cast of thousands, can you see what I did there ??

Following on from last weeks dipping into all things iron, I felt I should elaborate a bit more on our fabulous deal with these brilliant products.

Every one who takes advantage of our "Try before you Buy " scheme will be asked to fill in their own personal test report .... don't worry ... it's not "War & Peace", just a few simple questions with even simpler answers about how you feel the pans perform with your style of cooking. Your version of a "Which" report , if you like. By the way .... the Tagine ( pictured left ) is brilliant and very effecient.... we know, cos we've tried it !

Just simply for filling this in and returning it, we will offer you a 10% discount of your first purchase ( 3 item limit ) as a thank for your honest opinions and feedback. This will be a big help in further developments of new and existing products

If you get your first pans as a freebie with your new kitchen purchase from us then we'll still give you a chance to fill in the report with the same 10% discount off further ironware purchases.

There's so much more in the range than just pans, you know, it's worth checking out the full range either by coming in to see us or looking on Nethertons website:   http://www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

Just a short one this week, hope you all don't mind, testing has started already so we thought it important to let you about it and how we can work together to help new developments

" Th ... Th ... Th .. That's all folks !!  ( It's a cartoon thing ! if you're old enought to remember ? )

Jules

'Pan Handling' Done the Milestone way !

 Ey up my faithful Blogworms, this week is all about traditionally made, eco friendly, British produced, outstanding cookware

In this day and age where the words 'modern' and 'progress' nearly always refer to something electronic & technical, it's nice to see products coming onto the market where neither of those words apply.

Those who know me, know that my favourite phrase is 'Roman Engineering' keep it simple, solid, good quality, reliable and with very little to go wrong. The Romans achieved this phenomenally well with few tools and a great creative way of thinking.

This really does apply to this fantastic range of pans and cookware we've taken on to complement our eco kitchen ranges.


How can a pan be "Eco Friendly" I hear you ask..... well, these pans are from wonderful people at Netherton Foundries in Shropshire, the birthplace of our industrial revolution and heartland of our iron foundry work. They are manufactured using traditional techniques, (think Roman Engineering !) all the materials are sourced locally even down to the locally grown Flax oil used to season the pans and the Oak used for the handles. There are no toxic nasties included in the process of iron work itself and manufactured using more environmentally controlled plant and equipment.


Netherton themselves quote the following as a company ethos:


 Reduce the wasteful shipping of materials around the globe.

 Develop local supply partners and use sustainable materials.

 Use finishes and materials that can be restored and even improve with age.

 Be easily repaired with simple tools.  We will ensure spare parts are available.

 Be packed in readily recyclable packaging, which ensures the product arrives fit  for use.

We've talked at length to the enthusiastic and creative people at Netherton and we are going to be dealing with their product range through our showroom as we feel their products and ours will gel together beautifully.

But, you all know me by now .... there's a twist !!

We are going to pioneer a "Try before you Buy " system. These are damn good, well made, quality items of cookware but we know that different people cook in different ways so we're going to let you:

 Take a pan away for a few days,

Cook in it, 

See how you like, 

Clean it and bring it back, ( emphasis on the'clean it' )

Before you decide whether to purchase. Which we're pretty confident you will, if you're serious about your pans !!

So, Come on down !!, .... leave  us a deposit, take your pan away and have a go ! ... You've nothing to lose by trying something that just might change the way you cook forever !!  Bring the pan back for the next cooks to have a go and get your deposit back.

Oops ! nearly forgot, ..... there's a second twist ?  Every Eco Kitchen purchased from us between now and the end of July, will receive 2 of these remarkable pans totally free of charge with our compliments. Choose any 2 from a selection of 7 pans.

Pan Handling done the Milestone way is a much better way !!

Always looking for ways to improve our lives.

Jules

Having a smashing time !

Ey up my faithful blogworms, Having a smashing time this week, wish you were here !

Have you ever wished you could take out your frustrations with life by deliberately smashing hundreds of glass bottles ?

Well that's exactly what's involved with the fabulous worktop products I want to show you this week.

100% recycled glass worktops & splashbacks

If you're of an eco persausion ( as I trust all my blogworms are ! ) you may have seen many recycled glass products out there but the examples shown here are probably the only true contenders.

The wonderful people who run this business quite literally get hundreds, if not thousands, of waste glass bottles and smash them all to bits themselves. Give me a hammer !!

The particles are then all graded for size, in a machine of their own invention, from 5mm upto 20mm sizes. This enables different looks and textures to be created. Plain coloured panels and panels with a mix of colours can then be produced.

The next step is the really clever bit and the bit that makes these products stand out above all others. The particles are poured into moulds and placed in a kiln to fuse everything together. Unlike most other recycled glass worktops etc, these have nothing added to the mix .... it's pure glass !!. 

Many other companies add resins which is environmentally nasty and quite frankly .... cheating ! but not these.

There is some very complicated technical witchcraft takes place in the kilns through a complex series of timed temperature climbs and falls which take the glass through chemical changes to get the end result. I don't pretend to understand most if it but they clearly do !

What you end up with is a fantastically solid glass material which is a durable as granite and doesn't suffer from the scratches that lets most other glass products down. With it being glass it can also be used to fabulous effect by lighting behind it as shown by the splashback opposite ... Wow factor of what ??

It's perfect for worktops, splashbacks, tiles, etc and even, as you can see in the pic, many small custom items of furniture. The wonderful people who make this are also just as open minded as we are to looking at creating anything you may have in mind. All you need do is ask and they'll have a go !

As you know, from previous blogs, we have been dealing with another environmentally 'switched on' company .... H & M Retail Stores by supplying all their in-store staff kitchens, well.. ... we've just got the order for their kitchen and drinks stations in their head office in London and they have chosen this very recycled glass in pure white for the worktops in their main kitchen, we're really looking forward to doing it and seeing, what will be, the stunning results

Contact us for more details and samples, we know you'll be impressed with what you see.

Onward & upward. Jules

Watts a Lumen ??

Ey up my faithful blogworms, What's (Watts) a Lumen ??

You may well ask ...... I thought it was worth following up on my COB lighting blog with an attempt to clear up some of the pure gooble-de-gook that's written on the side of light bulb boxes

You will see all sorts of rubbish written on the side of LED light bulb boxes, how the hell do you figure out which bulb it is that you need for your lights at home......

 1)  Right, lets start with Energy ratings, if you're looking at Gu10 bulbs in your ceiling like the ones shown in the pics, you're normally these days looking at LED's to save energy and money.
Fact: All LED lights save energy because they're low wattage, you've got to be a 'muppet' not to realise that 5 watts burns less energy than 50 watts !. So largely you can ignore the energy rating cos that's common to them all.

 2) Next: the wattage, this does not  tell you how bright they are, it used to with the old tungsten lights but it doesn't really help any more. The wattage simply tells you how much energy you will be using when you switch them on.
Believe it or not, a 4w, 4.5w, 5w, 6w, 7w & 8w can all give the same light output !! ..... "Give me a break!" I hear you say, how on earth can that be possible ?? I'll explain in a minute.



 3) Hours rating for bulb life:  generally a total bloody guess, if it says 50,000 hours on a bulb packet. 50,000 hours at 8 hours a day is 17.12 years, how the hell did they test that ?? The main factor, as I understand it that governs bulb life is heat ie: how hot a bulb gets while it's switched on.
The cooler the bulb runs, the longer it lasts and the less energy  you lose to heat. So then, 50,000 hours is no real judge of the reliability and longevity of a bulb. The only way to ensure you get a good lifespan on a bulb is to buy known and reputable brands, you buy cheap imports they will blow in no time at all and you've only got yourselves to blame for buying rubbish in the first place !! Remember: Buy cheap, buy twice, there's a reason they're cheap !! TIP: avoid Chinese writing on the box !

4) The next piece of info you get is something that says 2600K, 3000K, 4000K or whatever. This info can actually be useful in your bulb selection cos it tells you how warm or cool the light is. Generally 2800K to 3200K is accepted as a 'warm' white light and 4000K as a 'cool' white light. 
As a rule of thumb, the number gets smaller it gets warmer and higher it gets cooler. This can help you choose how the overall atmosphere in the room looks.


5) This is where we get to the really important bit ....... How much light am I going to get out of the bulb ??.
OK, this is where Lumens comes into it, Lumens are the amount of light output you get from any given bulb. Simply put, the higher the number, the more light you get out of it.

You will see in the pic, left, 110 Lumens ( poor output) the one above 160 Lumens ( better but still hopeless), the energy smart one at the top of the blog 200 Lumens ( getting better but you'd still need a lot of them in your ceiling to light a room up !!)

Now compare these to the COB lights I talked about previously where Cob light output is 400 Lumens for warm white and 430 Lumens for cool white and you really begin to realise that when you're looking for new bulbs to give a good light, change you're thinking and look for the Lumens rating. Nowadays you simply cannot rely on wattage figures like you used to !

If you've not read my blog about COB yet, then read "COB but no corn" from my list, a lot more of this weeks blog will make sense.

I hope this has helped you to re-think how you look at buying your bulbs and gone someway towards explaining what to look for and what to ignore on the box.

Your faithful servant, as ever. Jules

Webbed feet ??

Ey up my faithful blogworms, as the gales and storms continue to lash the UK this week, comments are being made by experts saying ....

 "OK people, climate change is a reality, when are you going to start believing ?" ... 

I know in a lot of cases with you, my followers, we're preaching to the converted but the message has to be driven forward cos if not, we'd all better start growing webbed feet or start investing in companies who manufacture waders. I've a feeling that the poor unfortunate people in the South and West of our wonderful country are probably starting already !

As you know from all my previous blogs, doing as much as we can to help stop the advance of climate change is what we, at Milestone, are all about. 

 Just as a reminder of the wide and varied ways we can help:

Cabinets: High recycled content MFC form the basis for all our eco kitchens, standard and bespoke.

Doors:& Accessories: Massive choice including; High recycled content MFC, Recycled plastics in Yoghurt Pot and Coffee Cup, Sustainable hardwoods in Oak, Ash & Walnut, Reclaimed Softwoods, Sustainable Tulipwood, Ecologically sound MDF, Organic paints to paint most of the above


All of them made bespoke to suit your kitchen ..... it's what we do best !!

Worktops: Sustainable Hardwoods, Recycled Yog Pot & Coffee Cup, Recycled / FSC mix Laminate worktops, Recycled Glass made from real bottles and now .... upto 40% Recycled content quartz ..... MORE ABOUT THESE NEXT WEEK !

Handles and shelf brackets hand forged from re-used steel

Recycled content, UK made floor and wall tiles for kitchens and bathrooms

Low energy lighting: now concentrating on the brand new 'COB' technology .... which, according to my blog stats,  appears to have really captured your interest last week !

And last but definitely not least: 'A' rated appliances in all shapes and sizes, functions and styles.


There are no excuses for not doing your bit by way of eco friendly kitchens, bedrooms and bathrooms, we've got it covered in a 'one stop shop' and I'll vouch there's nowhere else in the whole of the UK that can offer you this exceptional level of eco friendly products in one place, what are you waiting for ???

Think about it !  ....which is easier ..... spending wisely on an eco friendly project for your home .... or growing webbed feet ?


For those of you who don't take environmental damge seriously ... Wake up and smell the Roses, it's happening now !!

No brainer really 'innit.  Jules.

COB but without the corn !

Well, my faithful blogworms, this last week has been a voyage of discovery !!

 COB but no corn ! 

What on earth does that mean ?

I feel I need to open your eyes this week to a brand new form of low energy lighting ...... COB , this information needs to be shared, so tell all your friends to read this !!

COB is a totally new way of looking at LED lighting that finally breaks all the myths that low energy lighting is slow, costly and ineffective. It means: 'Chip On Board'. This technology combines many small chips integrated into one large chip and then bonded to a suitable substrate.

OK, that's the techie bit out of the way, what does it mean to me, well I'll tell you in simple terms !

In our terms it means that we now have very good light output lamps that are on at full brightness the second you switch them on. The two you see here, a GX53 under unit light ( the flat round one) and a GU10 ceiling downlight ( the other one ) are both only 5 watts and have a Lumens rating of 475 for the GX53 and 430 for the GU10. 

Importantly: these lights are perfect for retro fitting to your kitchen, in some cases, if you have GU10's in your ceilng at the moment  ..... all you need to do is change the bulbs, Simples !

TOP TIP:   When you're choosing an LED light of any form, look at the lumens rating, this is the amount of light you're actually getting out of the lamp and is every bit as important than the wattage. The higher the number, the better the light output. Check out a few in the shops and you'll see that the figures for the COB lights are very good indeed.

I've been directly involved with Led lighting for kitchens for some years now and I've tried some sample lights. 

WOW!! is all I have to say ! these are absolutely brilliant, the best I've ever seen.

Check out these benefits:

• Higher light levels for lower wattages 
• Lower wattage means cheaper bills
• Instant light, no warm up time
• A better spread of light from the lamp with a more uniform appearance
• Lower cost than most LED lamps currently available
• They are dimmable using most leading dimmers
• They will work happily on home automation lights systems
• Available in Warm & Cool white, the warm white is a good soft light not like some of the sickly yellow light that comes from other types
• They run way cooler than normal LED lamps meaning a much longer lifespan with better stability

This should not be kept secret, I feel this is the most important development in LED lighting for a long time and it's going to take some beating, spread the word and get your friends buying:    

COB without the Corn !

Till next time, I'm relying on ya ! Jules.

Forging ahead with new designs

 Ey up, my faithful blogworms, news of more fab stuff this week. For absolutely ages I've wanted to have our own range of handles & accessories and via a particularly talented artist blacksmith I've had the pleasure of meeting recently ....


We now have our own range of hand forged, blacksmith made kitchen accessories .. and I'm well pleased !

We have, as you will see in the pictures, beaten metal handles, a very stylish pan trivet, forged & swaged flat metal shelf brackets and forged & welded straight brackets with hand rivetted supports.

These, following our natural materials theme from last week, would look fantastic with our natural Tulipwood kitchens, a real country, almost organic but contemporary feel.

Our tame blacksmith "Stig of the Forge" holds the industry standard blacksmithing qualification and a certificate of merit from 'The Worshipful Company of Blacksmiths' so you can be assured that our products are of the highest standard. ( and not only that, he's a thoroughly nice bloke !! )

All our products are made using a traditional methods on a coke forge and anvil, proving that even these days ..... hi tech is not always best and Roman engineering still has it's place.
No nasty chemicals are used in the finishing of our range, 'Stig of the Forge' prefering a simple linseed oil and beeswax mix. Applied while hot, it cures and gives a durable finish that only needs maybe a coat of wax once a year while you're whizzing round with the wax polish.

With a lot of new black steel these days having a high recycled content due to scrap metal dealers doing their bit to help the steel back into the cycle of things, they're pretty environmentally friendly aswell. Don't forget they can be recycled again at the end of their life.


This really has just been the start of things, establishing a basic range of useful accessories. We are open to suggestions from you, our loyal followers, as to what sort of things you would like us to make. 'Stig of the Forge' is a very talented and creative chap and loves a challenge !!

Contact us for more details or, better still, pop in and see us if you can. 

We'd love the chance to show you all our new goodies and hope you like them as much as we do.

Jules.

Wood made from Tulips, you must be joking !

Good morning, my faithful blogworms, my title says "you must be joking", actually that's part true, let me explain.

This week is all about the Tulipwood tree

More correctly known as Linodendron Tulipifera

Tulipwood is a very sustainable hardwood that's been grown in managed forests in the USA for decades and is a stable, easy to work and tremendously durable timber. Given it's name as the flowers of the tree do strongly resemble tulips.

It is essentially a pale hardwood that can have subtle streaks of reds, yellows, greens and even the odd bit of purple tinting its grain.

Depending on where it's grown, can influence the strength of colours you find and generally the closer to the heartwood you get, the paler the timber.

In the States it's commonly used for:

Sidings for houses

Interior joinery and furniture

Guitar bodies

And with it's resistance to termites, used for barns and barn doors, outdoor seating & benches and even coffins !

It's so workable and durable, you can even build cars out it !! see pic below

Note the number plate ! ... that car's in the UK somewhere and I really, really want one !!!

We do use Tulipwood over here in Britain but it's under-used and under-publicised and when we do use it, it's usually as a painted kitchen which is a massive shame.The timber in it's natural state is absolutely gorgeous. 

With it's characteristics, it's sustainability and the fact that it's a hardwood comparable in use to Oak but at about a third less cost, we feel we really need to bang the drum for Tulipwood and get people more interested in it's use for kitchens.

We are certainly going to be doing our bit to raise it's awareness throughout 2014 and we have sample doors made right now for anyone to come in and have a look at. 

Wood made from Tulips ! .... No, but it does look as fabulous as a field of tulips in springtime and as springtime is right around the corner, now would be a good time to give it a coat of looking at !!

Jules.

Bespoke by definition, our definition !

Ey up my faithful blogworms, Happy New Year to you all, I know it's the 11th but it's my first blog back in  2014. 

Today I want to give you a bigger picture of how we do .. what we do and I'm starting with the word 'Bespoke' as applied to kitchens

BESPOKE: it's a big word with even bigger definitions. When we speak of bespoke as a concept, 2 words come to mind: Expensive & Specialised.


Probably led by bespoke tailoring, bespoke jewelry, bespoke furniture, all things that are traditionally pretty expensive.

 Now 'Specialised' is definitely what we're about, you all know that our particular speciality is Eco Kitchens and our market is certainly nationwide UK but 'Bespoke' is our most important strength.

Bespoke is really the heart of how we do what we do !

Because we're not like all the other companies, we start with actually designing your cabinets from scratch, not just sticking them in a catalogue and saying " If it's not in there, we don't do it !" which means that every kitchen bought out of a catalogue like that is a compromise in some way.

We take the closest thing this industry has to a " standard list" of cabinet sizes at standard prices and change it to suit individual kitchens

How, you ask ? Simples, we say !  As an example of things we get asked:

"My plates won't fit in my wall units, they're not deep enough!"  Simple, take a standard wall unit and make it deeper, to change 1 unit dimension costs a tenner, £10

"I'd really like to have 2 ovens, 1 above the other in a tall housing" Simple, to change the gap for them to fit in, £10

"My ceilings are low and standard height units won't go in" Simple, shorten the wall units, a tenner each to alter.

"Can I have my  built in dishwasher up off the floor because I struggle to bend down to it" Yep, no problem, we'll modify a housing to do it, a tenner, £10

You get the picture !! If most of your kitchen is based on standard size cabinets, we only alter the ones that need altering, it's simple to do and each dimension change we need to make generally only costs a tenner, £10.

This is "bespoking" any kitchen to suit the needs of any person, doing it sensibly, doing it affordably and making the whole kitchen a bit special and importantly ..... it fits properly with no compromise !!

Having started by making the cabinetry fit perfectly and designed to take on board your particular way of working, it's then a simple excercise to put doors on it as we make all the doors to go with our kitchens anyway..... isn't life wonderful when it works properly ??

One kitchen we're working on at the moment doesn't have a standard unit in it !! because of space constraints and the appliance requirements, every single cabinet has been redesigned to fit, make best use of the space and it's all be done on a budget. 

Yes ... we can supply entire kitchens, custom made to a budget.
Yes ... we can supply custom cabinets on their own if you want to make your own doors
Yes ... we can supply doors on their own to odd sizes if that's what you need 
Yes ... we can fit it all for you or supply it for you to fit
Yes ... we can make custom worktop sizes, depending on material

 We take that attitude that, no matter how odd or unusual, if you can imagine it and give us a sketch, we can make absolutely anything you need to equip your kitchen and, importantly, we can do it for sensible cost, after all .... it's what we're extremely good at !

If that's not bespoke then I don't know what is !

All the best for the new year, Jules.