Arguably the most true-to-tradition modern interpretations of original Adirondack rustic designs are being made by big-city artisans who sell it as folk art to other city folks at prices that would make J.P. Morgan blink. I’m told there are rustic furniture boutiques on 5th Avenue in New York City–J.P would certainly approve.
Few of today’s rustic furniture makers are country people. They hold degrees from art schools and live and work in town. Their writings reveal little knowledge of the woods or the outdoors–a deficit that is more than counterbalanced by a high-craft knowledge of woodworking and a literate creative sensibility to abstract design inherent in the wood. Instead of furniture featuring stuffed animals or great looming oak burls, you will see soaring, airy designs that are highly individual and at once traditional and contemporary–many exhibiting a sense of humor, whimsy, and a playful flair for integrating form and function that no Adirondack guide could have imagined. I’d call it Post-Industrial Rustic Modern. Perhaps a little more modern than rustic. Surely postindustrial–what more stinging Generation X-style comment on a perceived decline of industry and commerce, end to affluence, and a reduced hope for the future than to resort to twigs to build high-fashion furniture? What a contrast with the post-WWII optimists and their plastic and chrome.