A Scots-American Classic

It is one of the great design icons - the 18th century classical mantel created by Robert Adam. Today Thistle & Rose honours his genius with faithful copies of the originals he inspired. For Adam, high style was a civic virtue for an enlightened nation, rather than the preserve of aristocrats. It was an ethos with strong appeal in the United States where the national style of Bulfinch and others echoed the Adam's spirit.

Recent research suggests that Scotland's crisp neoclassicism and America's Federal look were closely related. Benjamin Franklin first saw Edinburgh in 1759 as a medieval walled city. In 1771 he found it transformed into the 'Athens of the North', a classical wonderland of golden stone spread out below the ramparts of the ancient castle. He was duly astonished.

A 'dream city' made real by the artisans and entrepreneurs who built it, Edinburgh New Town is now a World Heritage Site. In each fashionable interior the keynote was the mantle, or chimneypiece. No effort was spared with design quality, particularly with those made by local firm Ramage & Ferguson, whose chimneypieces were amongst the finest architectural artefacts of the 18th century. Large numbers were shipped to the United States where, even today, many continue to enhance the houses they were first made for.

At Thistle & Rose we have revived the technologies of the master craftsmen who worked to the Adam drawing office, and can confidently state that no one in the world can make these masterpieces of the shared Scottish American Heritage with the levels of precision which is our accepted gold standard.

David Black