The Brimfield Antique show and Flea Market is open for its mid-summer sale this week, which made me think of Thomas O’Brien – master of the flea market find. Coincidentally O’Brien’s Aero Studio is having its 20th anniversary this year, so I decided to head to Soho to see what the store is offering 2 … Continue reading 20 Years and Counting
John Esty is the proprietor and resident craftsman at John Esty Fine Custom Framing, and has a reputation for being an exacting perfectionist. It’s a distinction he’s worked hard to create and maintain, and he’ll be the first to tell you he likes it that way. This is not just another frame shop – this … Continue reading Picture This
“Horse hair furniture is a bit of a misnomer, since the high-end upholstery industry has almost uniformly replaced the actual horse hair used to pad furniture with a nylon synthetic ‘hair’ that outlasts its namesake” explains Joe Calagna, the 3rd generation upholstery master who with his sister Lana own Anthony Lawrence-Belfair in NYC’s tony Flatiron … Continue reading Horse Hair Furniture
Batik is both the name of a wax resist dyeing technique, and the finished fabric it produces. The photo above shows a true Balinese batik, with its trademark “crackle” design. In principle it’s fairly simplistic, which belies convention. I tried my hand at making a batik with the help of Yvonne Sherer (a Jamaican master) … Continue reading Island Life
Jonathan Browning Studios “Ventoux” double armed sconce Jonathan Browning is the designer and master craftsman of the eponymous Jonathan Browning Studios in San Francisco. His work is intellectually backed with extensive knowedge about the history of design, and he shares that knowledge through visual references in each of his pieces. As a metal worker, he’s been on a decades long journey honing … Continue reading Industrial Influence
John Lyle Design, MARC CONSOLE SHAGREEN WITH BONE TRIM 29.5H X 39.5W X 20D http://www.johnlyledesign.com/home Back in the spring of 1979 as a freshman in Art School in rural Pennsylvania, I took a course in 3D design with a woman named Rosemarie Sloat. She was a painter at heart, but had a deep and disciplined … Continue reading Southern Gentleman