Mary Ratcliffe’s Trade Secrets
The ingenious carpenter makes bespoke pieces for unusual spaces
When Mary Ratcliffe was seven, her dad showed her how to weld. As a teen, she would lock herself in his workshop, where she taught herself woodworking. And in 2013, she started her own bespoke furniture company. Ratcliffe blends rustic materials with whimsical flourishes. She used shou sugi ban, a Japanese wood-torching technique, to turn a white ash table matte black, burning the surface to raise the texture of the wood grain and creating a sleek, silky finish. Her current projects include a 1971 Airstream trailer, which she’s retrofitting with a cozy reading room and dining area, and a bedroom for an 11-year-old girl built in a walk-in closet, with a wall-to-wall bed, hidden storage and an overhead loft.
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Caroline Aksich, a National Magazine Award recipient, is an ex-Montrealer who writes about Toronto’s ever-evolving food scene, real estate and culture for Toronto Life, Fodor’s, Designlines, Canadian Business, Glory Media and Post City. Her work ranges from features on octopus-hunting in the Adriatic to celebrity profiles.