That timeless quality

My wife, who loves blogs about interior design, stumbled across this article in which noted designer Leta Austin Foster described the essential elements of timeless interiors.

I was intrigued by Foster's comments about using local artisans:

Look around at your local craftsmen – there are so many good ones. You need to give them small things to do at first, learn how accomplished they can be, and then use them. Why would you order furniture from a catalogue – no matter how beautiful that catalogue may be – and then have to settle for furniture made half a world away with staples and glues which may well be poisonous. Buy local.

Yes! Furniture is like food: you often get a better quality when you buy locally from someone you know.

And believe it or not, the cost of furniture made right here in Asheville can be comparable to what you'd pay for the stuff stamped out by a factory on the other side of the world.

​Why? Because you don't have to ship it thousands of miles, and there are no CEOs or stockholders to pay.

Besides, do you want your furniture to come from here?

Or here?

I also appreciated this gem from Foster:

Forget your fear of brown furniture. Most antiques are brown furniture and the brown looks wonderful when it is contrasted with painted furniture, and chintz, and wallpaper, and beautiful curtains and rugs and so on and so on and so on. Look at Winterthur or the Metropolitan Museum and see how masterfully print fabrics and beautiful rugs, and painted furniture look with brown furniture.

It's amazing that so-called "brown furniture" went out of style even for a moment, when you consider how beautiful wood can be with a clear finish. You can see so much depth and pattern and light within the grain! I'm glad to hear it's at the forefront of the trend again.

I still appreciate furniture with modern lines, but I love to see it mixed in with classic designs like our mudroom cubbies.

And whether you love the fresh lines of modernism or the timeless appeal of traditional style, we'll be glad to help you design a piece for your home.

​That's the other reason to buy local: you can...

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