Category Archives: craft

How Much Would You Pay for This Man?

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Greg in his workshop

Greg in his workshop

Now think hard. This is our general manager, Greg Gloor, who will give you 30 hours of his time in our Woodbridge shop to help you make your own piece of Hardwood Artisans furniture.

You can bid on him at the grand opening of our Fairfax showroom at 2 p.m. this Saturday, Feb. 20. And you can have fun doing it: Alison asked a member of her church “who’s a really funny guy” to do honors as the auctioneer.

Your money will go toward a great cause: Kids R First, (www.kidsrfirst.org) a charity based in Fairfax County that gives 98 percent of its donations to school supplies and college scholarships to children from needy families in our region.

So that’s where the money goes. And what do you get with your 30 hours, you ask?

Well, here’s an answer from our esteemed artisans, and I quote:

•          Have you always wanted to learn how to build furniture or pondered what goes into the process?

•          Have you always wanted to know how the objects you sit on and eat on are built?

•          Do you want to gain knowledge so you can build the perfect chair you have always dreamed of or a nightstand that is just the right height?  These 30 hours with Greg will give you the basic skills and knowledge to do so.

•          Have you always wanted to learn how to design furniture, how to get the proper dimensions for a piece, what type of wood to buy, what nails you should use, if any?  All of these details you will learn in the 30 hours.

•          Greg Gloor is the founder and general manager of Hardwood Artisans.  He and his friend Larry started Hardwood Artisans in 1976 as a simple two-man shop using only a router, Skilsaw, hand sander and drill.  They built loft beds and platform beds from birch wood.

•          Greg knows woodworking. Greg knows furniture design. Greg is also a wonderful, fun person to work with and learn from.  Not only will you learn great woodworking skills, but we believe you will have an great time doing it.

•          The best part of this auction is how you will be able to put the skills and knowledge Greg teaches you to a practical use.  You and Greg will go through the process of designing and building your own piece at our incredible wood shop in Woodbridge.

•          Greg is willing to work these hours into your schedule.  If the weekends are a better time for you, we can arrange it.  If the weekdays work better, we can make it happen. We want you to learn a lot, enjoy your time and leave the shop feeling happy, and with a piece that you can call your own.

Ronni Jolles: Our New Artist Debut

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While we’re on a roll here to make everything in our Fairfax showroom different from all the rest, customers will now see the gorgeous paper-collage artwork of Ronni Jolles http://www.ronnijolles.com/ from Great Falls, VA hanging on the walls through April 1.

Artist Ronni Jolles

Artist Ronni Jolles

Ronni came to our VIP customer reception on Tuesday to demonstrate her technique (because, do you know anyone else doing artwork with paper?), and she’s just a delight, as is her work, which we felt was a great pairing with our handmade furniture.

The way we came together was purely by chance, but it also seems like there was some karma involved.

Silhouette of TreesbrLayered paper and pastelbr38 x 20

"Silhouette of Trees", Layered paper and pastel, 38" x 20"

Our marketing coordinator, Julianne Yurek, first went searching online for a good local artist to feature in the new showroom. “We were thinking about making our own artwork,” she says, laughing, “but that, of course, is never a good idea.”

So, Julianne started surfing, entering “northern Virginia artist” as a search term. After going through more than 30 artists’ Web sites, she found Ronni, who lives in Great Falls, VA. “There’s this beautiful texture that’s created through the piling and the layering of paper,” Julianne says. And the earthy, textural element that results is a wonderful match to the textures and tones of the furniture.

Blues and Greys of Winter, Layered paper and pastel, 20 x 30

"Blues and Greys of Winter", Layered paper and pastel, 20" x 30"

When Julianne called Ronni, it turned out that Ronni had known and admired Hardwood Artisans for years, which is such an incredible compliment. “I’ve always thought the furniture was absolutely amazing,” Ronni says.  “It’s so beautiful, it’s almost like an art piece. It’s one of these stores where I’d just like to buy everything from them.”

The feeling is mutual, Ronni. We’re even more impressed after watching this video http://www.ronnijolles.com/about.asp on her Web site, which documents her painstaking (and self-taught) process of creating each piece.

Cherry Blossoms, Layered paper and pastel, 28 x 22

"Cherry Blossoms", Layered paper and pastel, 28" x 22"

Midtown, Paper, fabric and pastel, 36 x 12

"Midtown", Paper, fabric and pastel, 36" x 12"

New Orleans Jazz, Layered paper and pastel, 25 x 21

"New Orleans Jazz", Layered paper and pastel, 25" x 21"

Ronni, an art teacher of 18 years who has been creating her paper collages for 10 of them, will move her work out of the showroom in April to exhibit in the prestigious Smithsonian Craft Show http://www.smithsoniancraftshow.org/indexmain.asp, of which Hardwood Artisans is a corporate sponsor, at the National Building Museum, where she has been accepted for the first time. In addition, she’ll be the only local exhibitor in the “paper” category.

Ronni Jolles at work

Ronni Jolles at work

We’re proud to say we knew you when, Ronni!

Artisanal Accessories in Fairfax

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For more than 30 years, Hardwood Artisans has sold, well, hardwood furniture made by artisans. Hence the name, right? Well, we decided to throw some more new artisans into the mix with our new Fairfax showroom, as part of our endeavor to make it different from the way we’ve always displayed our furniture in the past.

We’re now offering more accessories made in the same loving manner as our furniture, and they can be purchased only in Fairfax. Come take a look.

They include:

Gorgeous traditional shaker boxes made by Brent Roarke in New Brunswick, Canada

Nesting boxes

Nesting boxes

A cabinetmaker by trade, Brent Roarke has been making these boxes for 13 years, while continually coming out with new sizes and styles. Roarke, who works from a restored century-old barn, says the boxes are based on traditional sizes, but some of the newer products, such as a divided carrier, jewelry box, and bureau tray, are adapted to today’s uses.

Jewelry box

Jewelry box

He explains their popularity: “It’s a very tactile thing. It’s pleasing to the eye, but when you pick it up, it’s smooth to the touch, and they have an interesting shape.”

Swing-handle boxes

Swing-handle boxes

Handblown glassware by Simon Pearce

Pearce grew up in Ireland, working with his brother out of their father’s potter’s shed. As he came into his own as a potter, he traveled to work as an apprentice in New Zealand, where his passion extended to glassmaking as he started collecting old glass. “Each glass is made by one person, hand finished,” Pearce says in a video on his Web site. “That’s what really got me into glass.”

Nantucket lamp

Nantucket lamp

Pearce opened his first glass workshop in Ireland in the ’60s. “Like any skilled craftsperson, the way you learn is by doing,” Pearce says, “and that’s how I learned over two years, by blowing glass all day, every day.”

Hartland hurricanes

Hartland hurricanes

He moved to the United States in the late ’70s, settling in Quechee, VT, on a bucolic river the company produces its own electricity through hydro-energy. The facility is now a tourist destination, with a highly rated restaurant on the premises. As creative director Liz Ross describes the Pearce glassware and pottery, “It’s affordable luxury, to be used every day, and passed on to future generations.”

Corinth bowls

Corinth bowls

Bedding produced by the Rockville-based Blissliving Home

When Blissliving Home Founder Mei Xu was traveling the country, promoting her lines from the Chesapeake Bay Candle company, she noticed that the hotel beds she slept in had inferior linens.

The Audrey bedding set – bronzed leaves printed on cotton

The Audrey bedding set – bronzed leaves printed on cotton

That’s why she set out to create her own bedding, made from high-quality cotton from the Orient. In addition, spokeswoman Stephanie Tait says, “she’s always had this thing about how there’s a disconnect between home décor and fashion.”

Lucca Glacier bedding – lush dupioni silk with flange detailing

Lucca Glacier bedding – lush dupioni silk with flange detailing

The bold colors and patterns on the Blissliving duvet and comforter sets are inspired by nature, travel and fashion. “I get inspired anywhere and anytime,” Mei says in her style profile. “It can be a visit to the museum, a book I am reading, a fashion magazine, or a movie. Another major source of inspiration for my designs is my travels around the globe. I love to travel – I would not be happy without it – and I am fascinated with the different cultures of the world.”

The Ashley Gray duvet set – bold, graphic chrysanthemums printed on cotton

The Ashley Gray duvet set – bold, graphic chrysanthemums printed on cotton

We at Hardwood Artisans, of course, are steeped in the craft tradition, so when we are looking for accessories to sell with our handmade wood products, we want purveyors who are like-minded. In the Fairfax showroom here, you will be able to see that we’ve found them.

American Picture Frames: Choices by Artists and Collectors

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According to the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s website, “Carrie Rebora Barratt is Curator of American Paintings and Sculpture, and Manager of The Henry R. Luce Center for the Study of American Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.”

Last night, however, she was the speaker at the latest edition of the museum’s Collectors’ Roundtable series: American Picture Frames: Choices by Artists and Collectors. She spent a good portion of her time discussing the renovations they have just completed or are starting at the Met, but she did go into some detail about choices that have been made regarding the frame of a very high profile Met painting: Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze.

The painting was acquired by the Met in 1897. A picture from 1910 shows the painting in a great old frame, but in pictures from 1917, that frame is already gone. That said, the curators weren’t satisfied with just their own archival photos and they decided to do some more research.

Further archival research was done to determine the sort of frame that the artist would have preferred to see on the work. The Met turned up pictures from the New York Historical Society that showed the painting the same year it was painted (just after the Civil War) and the wild Federal Revival frame the artist had commissioned for it in a fit of mid-19th century nostalgia. They have commissioned a reproduction of that frame to show in their new galleries starting in 2011. Keep your eyes peeled for this because it’s truly something else—gilded with a huge carved rampant eagle on the top. Here’s a brief story about it from the New York Times that doesn’t have nearly enough pictures.

Though Barratt touched briefly on the craftsmanship required to create such a frame and professed to appreciate frames as works of art in themselves, it seemed clear that at heart, she truly is a paintings person and not so much a craft person. After all, her focus was what the artist would have wanted to see on their picture and not what the framer would have considered most appropriate. And she was fairly dismissive of collectors who change frames to suit their interior design.

This was underscored in a conversation I had with an American Art Museum docent during the reception after the lecture. Apparently getting docents for the American Art portion of the museum is much easier than getting docents for the Renwick. I had been under the perhaps mistaken impression that craft had gained more respect in museum-world than it appears that it has, at least among scholars and docents.

The final lecture of the spring series takes place Tuesday, May 19th when Dr. Walter O. Evans, major collector of African American art will discuss Collecting Outside the Canon.

CraftWeek DC April 22-26

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Local blog DCist has a great post about activities happening during CraftWeek DC, taking place between today, April 22nd and April 26th. Included are studio tours, lectures, a special tour by the curator of the Greene & Greene exhibition at the Renwick and any number of galas and benefits that mainly support the Smithsonian’s craft acquisition, research and education programs surrounding contemporary craft.

For fans of Etsy or Sugar Loaf, DC this weekend is going to be a veritable playground.

And don’t forget that Hardwood Artisans carries a range of American craft, from Ephraim Faience pottery to Motawi Tileworks decorative tiles to Robert Hargrave‘s unique sculptural wood clocks and mirrors.