Jeronimo Cooklin
Founder
In 1987, with a chemical engineering degree from the UK and an MBA from UCLA, Jeronimo founded South Cone Trading Co., an LA based accessories and furniture manufacturer from Perú. His love of nature led him to explore how the sourcing of South Cone´s wood affected the Amazon´s health, which led to the foundation of PaTS, Partnerships and Technology for Sustainability in 2001, an NGO in Peru’s central Amazon, to research conservation practices and create a sustainable development model based on wood.
Since 2002 Jeronimo had been sharing his findings regarding sustainability of our industry at High Point, introducing the concept of The Power of Furniture—emphasizing that our industry, which transforms raw wood into products of great value, can play a critical and valuable role in shaping the future of forests and, ultimately, the planet. Gathering a coalition of industry players and conservation organizations, Cooklin founded the Sustainable Furnishings Council in 2007. Serving SFC in various roles for over a decade, Jeronimo helped define sustainability for the furniture industry, spread awareness and build a larger coalition, before returning to his conservation work in the Amazon.
In 2021 Cooklin founded Mama Pats (Mother Earth in Andean / Amazonian dialects) a for profit corporation, to continue and scale the work of PaTS, which has worked in Peru’s central Amazon for over 20 years, teaching artisanship, woodworking skills, and producing tabletop products for the US market, hand crafted from sustainably sourced woods, adding value to local rainforests, and providing generations with an alternative to burning down forests to raise cattle or agriculture, one of the leading causes of deforestation in the Amazon.
Jeronimo lives in the Sacred Valley of Cusco, Peru.