Bespoke alcove and fireplace joinery by Reeve & Co – fitted bookcases, cupboards, display shelving and combined bookcase-cupboard units built precisely into chimney breast alcoves for London townhouses, Victorian terraces and country houses. Period detailing or contemporary clean profiles, painted or in natural hardwood, made in our Suffolk workshop.

The alcove bookcase: a classic commission, done properly

The fitted bookcase or alcove cupboard flanking a chimney breast is one of the most common fitted-furniture commissions in British domestic architecture – and one of the most often done poorly. Cheap timber, incorrect proportions, applied mouldings that sit proud of the cornice rather than returning to it, shelves that sag, and drawer boxes that refuse to run smoothly are all common signs that the joinery was not treated as a serious piece of furniture. Reeve & Co takes the alcove commission as seriously as any other: the proportions are drawn from the room’s own architectural language, the construction is solid, and the detailing at the cornice, dado and floor junction is resolved before a single panel is cut.

Our alcove and fireplace joinery has been installed in Victorian and Edwardian terraces in Kensington, Chelsea and Belgravia, in Georgian townhouses in the Home Counties, in a Belgravia apartment flanking a period marble chimneypiece, and in contemporary open-plan living rooms where the chimney breast provides the only natural opportunity for fitted storage. The approach differs in each case; the standard of making does not.

Alcove joinery types and configurations

Getting the proportions right

Alcove proportions are not arbitrary. The width of the bookcase frame, the depth of the shelves, the height at which the cupboard doors give way to open shelving, the reveal between the bookcase face and the chimney breast projection, and the profile of the cornice are all governed by the architecture of the room. In a Victorian terrace, the cornice profile, skirting height, ceiling height and window proportions provide a grid from which the bookcase proportions should follow.

We draw each alcove commission in elevation before manufacture begins, showing the frame widths, shelf positions, door sizes and moulding profiles in relation to the room’s existing features. This is where the proportion is fixed – not on site during installation, where it is too late to correct a decision that looks wrong.

What to consider before commissioning alcove joinery

The most useful question to answer before commissioning alcove bookcases is whether the primary purpose is display, storage, or a combination of both. A room that is primarily a sitting room, with books arranged for visual effect and occasional reference, calls for a different interior to a room that is also a working library, with books in heavy rotation, archive boxes at the base and a need for good shelf lighting. The design starts with the use, not with an aesthetic preference.

Shelf depth deserves specific consideration. Standard paperbacks and hardbacks are adequately housed on a 220mm shelf. Oversized art books, encyclopaedias and archive boxes require 300mm or more. A single shelf depth across all the shelves in a bookcase is sometimes right, but a deeper lower shelf with a shallower upper shelf, or a combination of fixed and adjustable shelf positions, often serves the actual collection better. We ask clients to measure a representative sample of their books before we draw the shelf layout.

The cupboard base below the shelves is frequently underused in alcove bookcases. It is often treated as a catch-all for things that do not have another home. With some thought at the design stage, the base unit can house a sound system and cables, a wine and drinks collection with a fitted wine rack, a home office’s filing and archive, or simply deep general storage with pull-out shelving that makes access easy. None of these require major additional cost; they require a brief and a decision before the drawings are completed.

Materials and finishes

Recent alcove and fireplace joinery projects

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Commissioning alcove joinery alongside other fitted furniture

An alcove bookcase commission is often the first piece of fitted joinery a client commissions from Reeve & Co. It is a contained brief with a clear functional outcome, and it tends to demonstrate quickly whether the workshop’s approach and standards are the right fit for a client. A significant proportion of our longer relationships with private clients and their architects begin with a single pair of alcove bookcases and extend from there into wardrobes, a fitted study, a kitchen, or timber panelling across several rooms.

For clients who are planning a wider programme of fitted joinery – perhaps a complete renovation of a London townhouse or a country-house refurbishment – it is usually more efficient to discuss the whole programme at the outset, even if the work is phased over time. The drawing and design work for several rooms can be co-ordinated as a single scheme, so the detailing and proportions read consistently across the house. This also allows us to plan the workshop programme more accurately and give realistic timescales for each phase.

Return to the fitted furniture overview or explore related services: timber wall panelling, TV and media joinery and fitted wardrobes.

Alcove joinery FAQs

Bespoke timber wall panelling designed and made by Reeve & Co – from traditional moulded panel rooms and French-polished oak studies to contemporary flat-panel and batten schemes for modern interiors. Every panelling commission is drawn in-house, made in our Suffolk workshop and installed with the care due to a room that needs to feel both settled and architecturally credible.

Wall panelling that is made, not assembled

Timber wall panelling is one of the oldest and most enduring forms of interior joinery. When it is done well – proportioned correctly for the room, made from properly dried hardwood, detailed at the cornice, dado and skirting, and finished by hand – it transforms a room’s character in a way that no other wall treatment can match. When it is done poorly, the same room feels cheap and temporary.

Reeve & Co makes wall panelling as proper joinery. Each scheme is drawn in elevation, with frame widths, panel proportions, moulding profiles and finish all resolved before any timber is cut. We do not use MDF sheeting dressed up with applied mouldings as a substitute for properly made solid-timber or veneered panels; the construction is determined by what the design requires and what will perform well in the long term.

Our panelling work covers London townhouses, Belgravia and Kensington apartments, country-house reception rooms, private studies, hallways, dining rooms and commercial interiors including private members’ clubs and hotel lobbies. We have also completed significant educational panelling commissions, including work at Ipswich School.

Panelling types and styles

French polishing and traditional finishes

Reeve & Co has its own French polisher, which places us in a small group of UK joinery workshops able to offer this finish in-house rather than subcontracting it. French polishing – the traditional shellac-based hand-built finish – is the correct finish for period oak, walnut and mahogany panelling, and for reproduction furniture where a deep, hand-applied lustre is required. We also apply oil, wax, lacquer and painted finishes in-house, so a panelling commission can include multiple panel species and finishes within a single room.

The distinction between a French-polished surface and a lacquered or oiled one is not merely aesthetic. French polish builds up in many thin coats, each applied by hand with a rubber, gradually deepening the grain and creating a surface that has real optical depth. It is repairable by hand on site if damaged. It responds to changes in humidity as the timber does. It is the right finish for panelling in a room that will be used formally and cared for properly. Lacquer is tougher, more resistant to water and less susceptible to bloom; it is the better choice for rooms that are in heavier use or where the surface needs to withstand the contact of daily life without regular maintenance.

Materials and finishes

Recent timber panelling projects

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What makes timber panelling last

Timber panelling fails when it is made without regard for the movement of wood. Solid timber expands and contracts with changes in humidity and temperature; a panel that is glued rigidly into its frame will split under seasonal movement. A panel properly housed in its frame with an appropriate clearance gap is free to move without deforming the face of the work. This is basic joinery knowledge, but it is often ignored in cheaper panelling installations where speed of production takes priority over long-term performance.

Reeve & Co makes panelling to perform over decades. We specify timber that has been properly dried and stored. We use appropriate substrate materials for painted work. We account for seasonal movement in the design of every panel and frame joint. We apply finishes that allow the timber to breathe where the species requires it, and hardwearing lacquer systems where the room demands it. The result is panelling that does not crack, does not delaminate, does not distort and does not need to be replaced within ten years of installation.

We have reinstated and extended existing panelling in listed buildings where the original eighteenth-century work was still sound, working to match profiles, timber species and finish so that the new work is indistinguishable from the old. This is exacting work and it is one of the most satisfying commissions our workshop takes on.

Where we work

Timber panelling commissions are accepted across London and the Home Counties, where the majority of our residential panelling work is concentrated, and in East Anglia and the wider UK for the right projects. We are experienced at working in occupied properties, listed buildings and heritage-sensitive interiors where the construction method and reversibility of the panelling are important considerations.

Panelling in the context of a wider project

Timber wall panelling rarely exists in isolation. In most residential commissions, a panelled room is also a room with fitted joinery: a panelled study will have a fitted desk and bookcases, a panelled hallway will have fitted cupboards and a boot room, a panelled dining room may incorporate a fitted drinks cabinet or display shelving. Reeve & Co designs and makes both the panelling and the associated joinery as a single scheme, so the reveals, moulding profiles, timber species and finish all read consistently across the whole interior.

This coordination matters. When panelling and fitted furniture are commissioned separately from different workshops, the junction between them is almost always visible: the cornice profiles do not quite match, the reveal widths are different, or the paint finish differs slightly. When they come from the same workshop, the room reads as a composed interior rather than a collection of individual elements.

Return to the fitted furniture overview or explore our related joinery services: home offices and studies, alcove and fireplace joinery and fitted wardrobes.

Timber panelling FAQs

Reeve & Co designs and makes bespoke fitted furniture for private homes across London, the Home Counties and the wider UK. Every piece is drawn in-house, made in our Suffolk workshop and installed by our own team – furniture that is particular to the room, the architecture and the people who live there.

Fitted furniture made as proper joinery

There is a clear difference between a run of off-the-shelf units fitted to a wall and furniture that has been drawn for the room, made from solid hardwood and detailed to sit flush with the cornice, the architrave and the skirting of the building it inhabits. Reeve & Co occupies the second category. Our fitted joinery is treated with the same rigour as a free-standing cabinet or a kitchen: proportioned from first principles, constructed with dovetailed drawer boxes, solid backs and hand-applied finishes, and designed so that it looks as though it has always belonged there.

Our workshop is based in Mickfield, Suffolk, but the majority of our fitted furniture work is in London and the Home Counties – Kensington, Chelsea, Belgravia, Mayfair, St John’s Wood, and private homes across Surrey, Hertfordshire, Berkshire and beyond. We also work regularly in East Anglia for the right residential and commercial projects. Distance is not the limiting factor; quality of commission is.

We work for private clients, architects, interior designers and developers who want furniture that adds genuine value to a building rather than simply filling it. The brief can be a single wardrobe wall in a Kensington flat, a complete fitted-study for a country house, or a programme of joinery across an entire floor of a Mayfair townhouse. The making discipline is the same in each case.

What we make

Our fitted furniture portfolio covers six principal categories, each handled as a distinct design discipline rather than a variation on the same box. Follow the links below for detailed information, photography and frequently asked questions on each type of work.

Design, materials and finishes

Every commission begins with a measured survey and a set of drawn elevations. Proportions are resolved before any timber is cut. We do not use pre-designed units as the basis for a fitted piece; we draw each component for the room it occupies.

Projects: recent fitted furniture commissions

View our full portfolio of completed projects

How a fitted furniture commission works

1. Conversation and brief – We discuss the room, the architecture, the functional brief and any design references. No design fee at this stage. Send photographs, plans or a simple description of what you need.
2. Site survey – We measure the room in detail: wall faces, ceiling heights, alcove depths, structural constraints, existing cornices, skirtings, reveals and service routes. Accurate measurement is the foundation of furniture that fits.
3. Design drawings – Elevations, cross-sections and material specifications are prepared. You approve the design before the workshop programme begins. We resolve proportion, storage, reveal widths and finish selections at the drawing stage, not after manufacture.
4. Workshop manufacture – Every component is made in Mickfield by our own makers. Carcases, drawer boxes, doors, mouldings and hardware are all produced and finished in-house. We do not subcontract the making.
5. Installation and finishing – Our own fitting team installs the furniture, scribes to the building and applies any site finishing required. We leave the room settled and complete, not simply delivered.

Why bespoke fitted furniture is better than off-the-shelf alternatives

The most common alternative to bespoke fitted furniture is a proprietary unit system: a range of standard-sized cabinet carcases with a selection of door fronts, assembled by a fitter and arranged to fill a given wall. There are circumstances in which unit systems are entirely appropriate, particularly in secondary spaces, rental properties and rooms where cost is the overriding constraint. For a principal room in a substantial private home, the limitations of unit systems are real and significant.

Unit systems are designed around standard dimensions. A wardrobe wall that is 3.4 metres wide will either have an uncomfortable gap or a visible panel infill because the units do not divide into the space evenly. A bookcase that needs to meet an existing cornice line will rarely do so cleanly; it will be too tall or not tall enough, and the gap above it will be filled with a piece of trim that reads as an addition rather than as part of the design.

Bespoke fitted furniture starts from the room. The wardrobe doors are sized to fill the wall from corner to corner and floor to ceiling, with reveals calculated from the room’s architecture. The bookcase cornice matches the room’s existing cornice and returns correctly to the chimney breast. The desk sits at the window reveal rather than stopping short of it. These are not luxury details; they are the difference between furniture that looks as though it belongs to the building and furniture that has been installed in it.

Reeve & Co makes furniture that belongs. That is the only standard we are interested in working to.

Who we work with

Reeve & Co accepts commissions from private clients who want to deal directly with the workshop, and from architects, interior designers and developers managing larger residential programmes. We are experienced at co-ordinating with other trades on site and at reading and working from architectural drawing packages.

Our private client base is predominantly across London and the Home Counties, with a growing number of country-house and estate commissions. We also work with commercial clients – private members’ clubs, boutique hotels, schools and estate offices – where the standard of finish required matches the residential work.

The right enquiry usually comes from someone who has thought about what they want the furniture to do and the room to feel like, and who wants a workshop that will engage with that brief seriously. We are not trying to be the fastest or the cheapest fitted-furniture company in London. We are trying to make things that last and look right for decades.

Frequently asked questions

Bespoke TV and media joinery by Reeve & Co – fitted media walls, integrated television cabinetry, AV storage and combined bookcase and media units designed around the technology requirements of a room without allowing technology to dominate it. Made in our Suffolk workshop, installed across London, the Home Counties and the wider UK.

A media wall designed as furniture

A television on a white wall is not a design solution. A TV and media unit that has been designed as a piece of furniture – with the screen positioned at the correct height for the room, the AV equipment housed in ventilated and accessible compartments, the cabling concealed from the outset and the surrounding cabinetry scaled and detailed to read as part of the room’s architecture – is a fundamentally different proposition.

Reeve & Co designs and makes bespoke TV and media joinery for private homes across London, the Home Counties and the wider UK. Our media cabinetry ranges from a single fitted TV cabinet flanked by shelving and cupboards in a sitting room to a full chimney-breast media wall in an open-plan apartment, designed as a combined media, display and storage piece with concealed cabling and integrated surround-sound provision. The common thread is that the technology serves the room rather than the room serving the technology.

Media joinery types and configurations

Cable management and AV integration

The most common failure in fitted media furniture is cable management treated as an afterthought. Visible HDMI cables, exposed power strips and inaccessible equipment bays are signs that the joinery was not designed around the technology it houses. We resolve cable management at the drawing stage: routing cables through the structure of the cabinetry, incorporating ventilated equipment bays with pull-out shelving for easy access, and designing in-wall cable routes in co-ordination with the client’s electrician and AV installer.

We work alongside AV installers and acoustics consultants where the brief requires it. Our role is to produce the cabinetry that makes their work invisible – so the room functions as intended and looks as though the technology were always part of it.

Designing a media wall that reads as furniture, not as technology

The principal design challenge of a fitted media wall is that it is organised around a specific and often visually dominant object – a television – that the furniture is nonetheless trying not to emphasise. The approaches are broadly three. The first is to house the screen in a cabinet with closing doors, so that it disappears when not in use and the cabinet reads as a sideboard or dresser. This works well for screens up to approximately 65 inches and in rooms where the television is used intermittently rather than as the primary activity.

The second approach is to acknowledge the screen by designing the cabinetry around it deliberately – a framed recess at the correct height, flanking shelving or cupboards that balance the visual weight of the screen, and a base unit below that houses the AV equipment and provides a surface. The screen is present but the furniture governs the composition. This is the most common approach for open-plan living rooms, family rooms and sitting rooms in London apartments.

The third approach is the dedicated media or cinema room, where the joinery is a complete interior – wall panelling, acoustic treatment within the furniture frame, concealed projector housing, fitted seating surrounds and integrated lighting. The room exists for the technology but does not look like a shop floor. We have designed and made a number of private home cinema interiors for London clients and country-house projects where a dedicated media room is part of the wider renovation brief.

Materials and finishes

Recent TV and media joinery projects

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Choosing the right design for your room and screen

Screen size has a significant bearing on the design of the media joinery. A 55-inch screen can be concealed behind a pair of hinged cabinet doors without difficulty. An 85-inch screen requires different thinking: the doors become unwieldy at that scale, and a framed recess with the screen as an acknowledged feature of the room is usually the better design solution. For very large screens – 100 inches and above – the screen often becomes the wall, and the joinery frames it on either side with closed storage, integrated lighting and flanking shelving.

Viewing height is a separate consideration. The correct height for a television screen is determined by eye level when seated – typically with the centre of the screen at or just below seated eye height (approximately 1,050-1,100mm from floor level). Many media units place screens too high, which causes neck discomfort and reduces the quality of the viewing experience over time. We position screens at the correct height as part of the design drawing, not as an afterthought once the cabinet has been built.

Where we work: media joinery across London and the Home Counties

TV and media joinery commissions are accepted across London – including Kensington, Chelsea, Notting Hill, Belgravia, Mayfair, Islington, Hampstead and Marylebone – and across the Home Counties for the right residential projects. We also work in East Anglia and take UK-wide commissions where the standard of finish required is consistent with bespoke workshop making.

Media joinery is frequently part of a wider fitted furniture programme. A sitting room commission might include the media wall, a pair of alcove bookcases, wall panelling and a fitted drinks cabinet – all designed as a single coordinated interior. We are experienced at managing and delivering these wider programmes, and at co-ordinating the joinery with other trades including plasterers, electricians, AV installers and decorators.

Return to the fitted furniture overview or explore related services: alcove and fireplace joinery, timber wall panelling and fitted wardrobes.

TV and media joinery FAQs