Our Team

Eric Williamson

Eric Williamson has been the main design force behind Timberkits over the years. His combination of engineering skills and extremely fine craftsmanship is quite unique. He has constantly delighted his audience with a never ending fund of ideas and ingenuity.

His fascination has always been with the challenge of giving mechanical models natural movement and life. It is particularly entertaining watching him in the workshop performing the actions and finding their mechanical equivalent in a happy little mad world of his own. The design process is truly a back of an envelope journey littered with mugs of tea, sawdust, muttering and the odd euphoric shout of victory.

A full account of Eric and his work can be found in Our Story.

Ideas for models come from all sorts of random sources and go through many different experimenting, prototyping and refining stages before being prepared for production.

Sarah Reast

Sarah Reast is the Director of Timberkits following the retirement of
the founders, Eric and Alison Williamson in 2012. Sarah’s background is in design and she brings a fresh eye and a playful creativity to the company. She manages the team and the development of projects, bringing together practical specialists and skills for each new challenge. She also unloads lorries and makes tea.

Luise Willis

Luise Willis has been with the company since 2000 and knows the models and production processes inside out. She has developed a fantastic working relationship with our manufacturers in China over the years and has a longstanding knowledge of all our customers. Luise is chief model builder, and helps customers with their technical enquiries. She is also the office manager and what she doesn’t do would make a shorter list.

Touker Suleyman Our Very Own Dragon!

After Timberkits appearance on the popular TV programme, Dragons Den, we were delighted to welcome Touker Suleyman as part of our team as an investor and mentor. Our very own Dragon!

Source Design

Source are the digital design team that look after the website and packaging design. They offer a wealth of experience and technical expertise and have become invaluable associates to the business.

Joe Purches

When he is not flinging himself at rocks or large bodies of choppy water, Joe does our photography, instruction booklets and brochures. He also gets roped into trade fairs, display installations and any other job where we can apply his multiple talents.

Josh Reast

Meet the muscle man in the warehouse, Josh is a mean, keen box stacking machine....but only when you feed him lots of tea and biscuits. He does a myriad of other jobs too including winding up his Grandad (Eric).

Elaine Turnbull

Elaine is our newest member of staff, her super-power is to calmly navigate her way through the myriad practical challenges that the Timberkits workshop and office throw up and apply herself where needed. She appears to be unfazed by the inordinately high levels of background quirk! Elaine is first and foremost a musician though and is mildly obsessed with brass bands...

We love wood in all its forms, the smell of the sawdust, its
warmth and colour and the variety in its character.