With the last Oak slabs from our 2024 Surrey Oak, we decided to do something truly extraordinary. Instead of mass production, each slab has been individually batch-cut, worked, and transformed into a unique, one-off statement piece for sale directly to the public on our website.
Because these heirloom pieces are shaped by both nature and craftsmanship, each board in this limited 25-piece collection is named after a storm from the European Windstorm Naming Scheme.
Each slab was batch cut and worked. Each one is released as a unique product in our shop. One-off purchases. Following the unique pieces of nature and craftsmanship, they follow the European Windstorm Naming Scheme.
The Ultimate Kitchen Statement Piece
A premium, bespoke solid oak chopping board. “One-off” boards, carved from a single continuous piece of timber from a single felled tree, representing the ultimate tier of luxury kitchenware. These one-off heirloom pieces are not glued together from multiple strips; they preserve the exact, uninterrupted natural grain, medullary rays, and outer contours of that specific historic tree.
Because a single-wide piece of oak is highly susceptible to cupping or twisting, we have air-dried them for 2 years adn then worked each piece into its own board. These expensive statement boards are sourced from an ancient, slow-grown timber that fell in a farmer’s field in 2024.
Artisans Crafting Single-Slab Tree Boards
We took all the “Character Oak” slabs from a locally felled Oak in a farmer’s field in East Surrey and let them air-dry for over 2 years. There is an exact location and story for each one of the BBQ blocks that came from the English Oak.
These are perfect ultra-premium, massive preparation, presentation or charcuterie blocks retaining their organic contours, where beneficial with food-safe transparent epoxy resin to make a smooth finish. Once fully cured, it’s a durable, glass-like finish.
These are Thick, durable, and naturally knife-friendly boards that are designed for years of daily use in the kitchen or BBQ shack. Every board has already been individually machined and sanded, and is now being finished by hand 1 by 1, allowing the natural grain and character of the oak to take centre stage. They come to market as we finish them and will bear the name in the order they are released. We have 25 from this last batch.
Why these are the ultimate Chopping Coards
- Owning a time capsule: Trees are nature’s ultimate historians. Every ring in these Surrey Oak slabs represents a season of survival, and the outer contours were shaped by the very atmosphere of the home counties. By naming each board after a 2024 storm, we aren’t just labelling a product—we are cataloguing the exact climate timeline this tree endured. When you prepare a meal on ‘Isha’ or ‘Ciarán’, you are interacting with a physical time capsule of a historic British winter.
- Working With the Storm: In mass-produced factory furniture, knots, fissures, and wild grain are sliced away in favor of uniform, sterile perfection. We take the opposite approach. We looked at the structural stress lines caused by decades of high winds and saw an opportunity for art. By stabilizing the organic voids with crystal-clear resin, we preserve the tree’s battle scars without sacrificing a perfectly flat, hygienic prep surface. You aren’t buying a flawless factory board; you’re buying a storm-sculpted masterpiece.
- A Centurian Heirloom: An English Oak takes a century to grow, decades to mature, and—in the case of this batch—two patient years to properly cure in our yard. A piece of timber with this much density and history doesn’t belong in a landfill after a few years of use. We built these colossal blocks to outlast the kitchens they are placed in. They are designed to be seasoned, scarred by family feasts, and passed down to the next generation of cooks as a symbol of British resilience.
- “One-of-One” Warning: Because nature never repeats its brushstrokes, the collection is strictly limited to 25. Once ‘Agnes’ or ‘Gerrit’ is claimed, that specific grain pattern, weight, and silhouette are gone forever. There are no duplicates, no second chances, and no backorders. You are choosing the exact companion for your culinary space that speaks to you—a singular force of nature for a singular kitchen.
- Heavyweight feel: You don’t just look at a single-slab block; you feel it. Weighing in as serious heavyweight kitchen armour, these boards bring a tactile authority to your countertop or shack. There is a distinct, satisfying thud when a knife hits a solid, two-inch-thick piece of slow-grown English Oak—an acoustic feedback that flimsy, glued-together edge-grain boards simply cannot replicate. It changes the entire energy of meal prep, turning everyday cooking into a deliberate, sensory ritual.
- A Controlled Cure: In an era of instant gratification, luxury takes time. When this oak fell in 2024, we didn’t rush it straight to the kilns to force the moisture out. Instead, we let it sit. For over two years, these slabs underwent a controlled air-cure, breathing with the changing seasons, slowly releasing tension, and acclimating to the British atmosphere. The traditional method is highly expensive and requires relentless monitoring, but it’s the only way to ensure a single, wide slab achieves the structural equilibrium needed to live on your countertop without warping. We did the waiting so that your board can do the lasting.
- Own identity in our store: Because each of these 25 pieces represents a completely distinct geometric silhouette and grain pattern, they will not be listed with stock photos. Each board will have its own dedicated spotlight in our shop. When you claim yours, you are adopting a specific identity. Every board comes with a physical provenance certificate detailing its exact dimensions, the specific coordinate origin of the Surrey Oak tree, and a breakdown of the historic 2024 storm it was named after. You aren’t just buying kitchenware; you are archiving a piece of natural history.
- Grounding in local provenance: There is a poetic irony in where this timber began and where it ended its journey. For centuries, this tree stood rooted deep in the quiet soils of East Surrey, absorbing the elements season after season. It survived decades of British winters, only damaged by a storm in 2024 and then needing to be felled. This is hyper-local provenance meets big storm-bashing; we’ve created a collection that is deeply rooted in English soil and the wildness of the sky.
The 2023/24 Season List (Covered January – August 2024)
For the storms that took place during the first eight months of 2024, the Met Office operated under the previous year’s designated list. You can review the full archived impacts on the Met Office 23/24 Storm Hub. The 2024 calendar year was one of the most volatile and active storm periods in recent UK history, spanning two distinct official storm-naming seasons. Powerful low-pressure systems driven by an intense jet stream repeatedly battered the British Isles, prompting rare Red weather warnings and record-shattering rainfall totals.
- A – Agnes
- B – Babet
- C – Ciarán
- D – Debi
- E – Elin
- F – Fergus
- G – Gerrit
- H – Henk
- I – Isha
- J – Jocelyn
- K – Kathleen
- L – Lilian
- M – Minnie
- N – Nicholas
- O – Olga
- P – Piet
- R – Regina
- S – Stuart
- T – Tamiko
- V – Vincent
- W – Walid
