Basket Case
Rwandan Women Weave for Peace and Prosperity
Monday, June 25, 2007
Rwandan genocide widows are helping rebuild their lives and their country’s economy through their ancient tradition of basket weaving. Sold through Macy’s, the baskets provide income to rural women who had never before earned money. Each basket is woven using ancient techniques and traditional materials.
Each Kivu basket takes a month to make. First, men gather bamboo from the forest and weave sturdy inner frames to give the basket its distinct shape. Women then weave the outer basket using exquisitely fine stitches.
Crafted of sisal and sweetgrass that grow in the Rwandan plains, the Treasures basket, with its tight lid, has traditionally been used to safeguard cherished belongings.
The pagoda-shaped Night Peace basket—so unique to Rwanda that it is included on the national seal—has been woven for centuries. Crafted from naturally dyed papyrus and banana leaf, the zigzag design tells an ancient story of friends walking together, visiting neighboring villages along the way.
Order online only from macys.com.
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Lighten Up!
Leather Furniture Goes Pale
Monday, June 11, 2007
So you thought leather furniture was tufted London gentleman’s club brown, slippery 80s bachelor pad black (goes with chrome) or rustic Western (let’s hear it for antlers). Well, don’t tell that to Hancock and Moore. Yes, they’ve got the standard color palette, but they’ve also got a knockout selection of pale, creamy shades that will change the way you think about leather furniture.
They hand-select their leather, looking for grain consistency, which means color will be absorbed evenly. With eight-way hand-tied springs and other hallmarks of fine, hand-made furniture, a Hancock and Moore piece is built to last. Local retailers are Davidson’s in San Luis Obispo and Cabana Home in Santa Barbara.
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Going Long
Easy-to-extend tables accommodate summer crowds
Thursday, May 31, 2007
If you’ve ever had to make room at the table for unexpected guests, you’ll love the extendable tables from Hülsta. The extension mechanisms are light and easy to operate. Best of all, a table that has already been laid can still be extended.
The glass-topped (yes, you can have an extendable glass table!) ET 600 table pulls out in one movement to 3.12 meters (almost 10 ¼ feet). To extend the velvety smooth solid alder or beechwood ET 800, push back the tabletop, slide out the extension panels and unfold. Voila!
That these features come from Hülsta is not surprising. This is the company that designed the first modular living room units. Check out Hülsta.com for dealer and purchase information.
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Fire and Ice
A Cool Accessory Heats up Fireplaces
Friday, December 22, 2006
Glass comes from fire. And now fire comes from glass. The latest in fireplace accessories looks like flames rising out of ice crystals. And it’s not only compelling to see, it’s beautiful, clean, affordable and safe for the environment.
Fire crystals are nuggets of tempered glass used as a replacement for gas logs in natural gas or wood burning fireplaces and fire pits. No soot, smoke or ashes, just brilliant color and gentle warmth.
The 10 available colors include red, sapphire, burgundy, orange, gold, green and white. You can use one color or mix and match. Colors won’t change or degrade.
And while the crystals look cool, the glass itself radiates heat, providing a constant flow of warmth. It is said to produce up to 600% more heat than gas logs and to be more efficient because there is nothing blocking the radiant heat produced by the flame and hot glass.
Cleanup is easy – if dirt builds up, just scoop out the glass and wash it with dish detergent followed by a thorough rinse.
You can find crystals locally at FireCrystals in Paso Robles. Or visit their online store, which has a handy calculator to help you figure out how much you’ll need (their tip: use less expensive glass on the bottom.) Crystals are sold by the pound and there are no minimum orders.
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Working for Scale
You've Never Seen Marble Like This
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Scagliola, the venerable art of engraving intricate designs on slate or marble, is alive and well. Scagliola comes from the mineral selenite, a variety of gypsum that in its natural state appears in the form of thin plates or scales (thus the name scagliola, from the Italian word scaglia or scale).
After the mineral is cooked and ground to a fine powder, it is mixed with pigments of colored earth and glues to form a thick paste. The colored paste is applied into designs carved in slabs of marble or slate.
For elaborate decorative motifs, subtle gradations of color are added in diluted scagliola applied by hand with a fine paintbrush. Lastly, the slab is polished with polishing stones, wax, and lacquer.
Scagliola’s complex twists and veins go deep into the stone, providing a durable surface which is far more permanent than faux surfaces that are painted to resemble marble.
In the late 19th and the early 20th centuries, scagliola was also very popular in the United States. Artificial marble furnishings at that time were created chiefly by itinerant plasterers, men who kept the details of their fabrication process a secret. After the 1920s, however, techniques of fabrication were forgotten. Scagliola virtually disappeared from American architecture.
Today, the use of artificial marble has again revived. This resurgent interest is the result of four factors: a new appreciation of marble-like finishes, a dissatisfaction with the limitations that real marble places on design, the unavailability of traditional colors and types of marble, and the rising costs of quarrying.
Scagliola is inherently beautiful and can duplicate the appearance of any type of marble, and it can be molded into any shape. Decorative, three-dimensional motifs impossible to produce in marble can be fabricated in scagliola. Because the artificial stone is less expensive than its marble original, it is a particularly attractive option for interior design and decoration.
The premier practitioners of the art are the Bianchi family of Florence. Among their clients are the likes of the Agnellis, Prince Michael of Kent and ZaZa Gabor. But you too can have your own little piece of Bianchi scagliola—prices start below $500. Make an appointment to drop by the workshop or showroom if you’re planning to be in Florence, or view their catalogue online.
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Quit Wining
And Make Some Furniture
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
California furnituremaker Whit McLeod turns out award-winning pieces from his Arcata studio deep in redwood country. But his furniture is made not from the surrounding redwood but from wood that has already done duty farther south, in wine country.
McLeod’s singular pieces are almost entirely constructed of reclaimed lumber. Specifically, salvaged oak quartersawn wine barrels. His current inventory consists of material from six different California wineries, made of great oak trees from as close as Mississippi to as far away as France and Hungary.
McLeod’s professional career began in Northern California redwood forests, on the other side of the bark as a wildlife biologist. His reverence for the natural world is reflected in his line of handmade Arts and Crafts furniture.
That spirit of preservation informs his manufacturing process, from relying on vintage machinery that McLeod has retooled himself, to scouring scrap yards for copper to be melted down in his foundry for tiles used in tabletops. Accordingly, every facet of work is done in-house — unusual today but not during the heyday of the Arts and Crafts movement.
His folding chair feels like museum-quality sculpture. Made from white oak, each chair is numbered by the artist on the underside of the seat and branded with the name of the winery where the barrel was used. Finished with natural linseed oil, the chairs retain their original color when used indoors or age gracefully outdoors.
McLeod’s furniture has been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Fine Woodworking and numerous other national publications. He has been given the American Crafts Council Award of Achievement and his work has been exhibited in the Oakland Museum. Working with McLeod are his wife Kristy and a team of three craftsmen.
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