Collingwood, Peter

Peter Collingwood was born in London in 1922 . His father, who had been a professor of physiology at St Mary's Medical School, died when he was 12. Collingwood studied at Epsom College and then at St Mary's Hospital Medical School from 1942-1946 .

After qualifying in 1946 he went to work at Hertford County Hospital. His first career was as a doctor, specialising in surgery, where he first saw looms being used in the occupational therapy department. He was called up for National Service; after the war he went to Jordan for nine months with the Red Cross to treat Arab refugees from Palestine. During this time he saw people weaving for a living and began to collect textiles. Shortly after this, he visited Ditchling and in 1950 started to work with Ethel Mairet, then in her seventies, at Gospels. After six months, he moved onto the workshop of Barbara Sawyer in London. Collingwood and Sawyer worked together for about six months making floor rugs for the new schools in Hertfordshire, as well as tablemats using a variety of materials. He left to go onto Alistair Morton's Lakeland design workshop in 1952 .

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