Upholstery Apprentice Bristol, England

South West Upholstery Limited

Full Time Bristol, England 9.5 GBP HOURLY Today

Job description

South West Upholstery is a growing family-run upholstery and bespoke furniture company. This is a fantastic opportunity for apprentices to join our team. You will carry out interesting and varied work in a friendly environment. With regular socials, flexible working, and a paid day off for your birthday, we offer a welcoming environment to work in and would love to hear from you if your looking to retrain or enter a new career in upholstery.

Apprentice Upholsterer

South West Upholstery have openings for X4 enthusiastic apprentices to join our great Upholstery team. We are looking for great people to join our team who want to learn and have great passion for upholstery & furniture restoration to lead to a long term career.

The successful candidates will be trained in all aspects of Upholstery through WEBS Furniture Training structured programme in Nottingham which you will attend every 3 months for 1 week at a time. As well as on the job training at our workshops in Bristol. Learn practical skills and techniques to produce different types of soft furnishings and upholstery.

Apprenticeship summary

Being an Upholsterer, you will be required to work in anyone of a wide range of production environments. Workplaces can be a variety of size from small work-shops through to large commercial factories; either way you will need to be able to work independently and as a part of team. Our current workshop is around 11,000 SQ Foot where we have a highly skilled team of 25+ People.

Duties of an upholsterer could include:

Stripping down items of furniture from covers back to the wooden frame.
Prepare frames for upholstery including adding different densities of foams and fibres.
Using a wide range of spring systems including serpentine, super loop, box spring units.
Filling cushions using fibre, foam and feathers.
Working with a large range of materials including fabrics and leathers.
Cutting various materials for ready for upholstery.
Tension and straining materials to position them.
Patten matching fabrics within tolerance.
Using a range of trimmings and finishing’s including buttons, facings, piping and decorative studs.
Using traditional methods such as slip stitch, tacking and hand sewing.
Using traditional fillings including coir fibre, horse hair, hessian and cotton felt.
Using wide range compressed air equipment including clip, frame, staple, pin and vertex guns.
Use a range of hand tools including scissors, shears, staple lifter, tin snips, hammers mallets and pincers.
Creating different types of pleats including scroll arm, envelope and puckering.
Cutting materials with templates.
Sewing fabrics ready for upholstery.
Good housekeeping and general labouring duties.
Good organisation workloads ready production.
Working with mechanical components from recliner actions to bed actions.
Completing leather repair and service work to furniture.
Checking and ordering new stock, managing storage of stock.
Working as part of a team on piece work production.
Working independently, using your own initiative.

Weekly wage

* We pay the national living wage during your apprenticeship which is higher than the apprenticeship advised rate** This will depend on your age and pay does vary.

Working week

Monday – Friday 7am – 4pm

Total hours per week: 40.00

Expected duration

16 - 18 months

Points to note -

An interview will be held and if successful you will be asked to work a 5 week trial where you are paid, this is to give you the chance to work in our team and see if the role is a career for you, during this time we will be assessing you to see if you could be our next apprentice.
After the 5 weeks if successful you will start the course to completion.
You will be trained in our workshops in Bristol - BS3.
Upholstery college is in Nottingham where you will attend every 3 months for X1 week at a time, hotel, transport and food will be paid for.

Apprenticeship level

Intermediate Level 2 (GCSE)

Requirements and prospects

Desired skills

Skills required to becoming an Upholster:

Excellent attitude
Be punctual
Be able to adjust to working on different designs and models of furniture
Excellent team working skills
Basic numeracy skills
Excellent attention to detail
Being able to work within a factory environment
Being able to work confidently under pressure
The ability to meet targets and deadlines

Personal qualities

Excellent attitude and attendance
Willingness to learn
Enthusiastic and practical
Friendly and be passionate about the role

Desired qualifications

None required, however the successful candidate will work towards their Functional Skills in both maths and English if they have not achieved prior or have an equivalent.

Future prospects

Progression Opportunities:

Advanced Apprenticeship in Modern Upholstery, traditional Upholstery, Supervision or Furniture design and Prototyping
Progression within the organization to include more responsibility and wider range of upholstery production work.

If this sounds like you we would love to hear from you!

Job Type: Apprenticeship

Salary: Up to £380.00 per week

Benefits: