1、ITS A PHENOMENON AS OLD as America itselfour taste in furniture, as in fashion, is fickle. In the early 19th century, the winged pedestals of English Regency were brushed aside for the sleeker lines of Grecian Plain. Our suburban forefathers moved Danish modern into the attic and trucked in lumberin
2、g Spanish revival. And today were putting our playful blob lamps on eBay and returning to simple, locally made pieces.Call it the New American Minimalism. It usurps our 2000s-era romance with confections perhaps best represented by the Dutch brand Moooi, which conjured up crocheted side tables and L
3、ouis-style chairs burned to a slight crisp. It also bears little resemblance to older minimalist vocabularies, like the colorful Memphis style that was parodied in the 1988 movie Beetlejuice. Instead, honesty is now the policy: reserved shapes, natural materials, apparent construction and hand finis
4、hing.Consider the Maxhedron chandelier by Bec Brittain, a prism of one-way mirrors mounted into a steel armature. Or maybe the Wave Bench by Seattles Henrybuilt Furniture, with gentle curves and the occasional game board routed into a wood slab that also boasts visible mortise-and-tenon joinery. Suc
5、h thoughtfully detailed forms encourage the consumer to care for the people making it for them, said designer Lindsey Adelman, who is based in Brooklyn, N.Y.Ms. Adelman (who employed Ms. Brittain until last year) is known for chandeliers with handblown glass volumes projecting from spare, branchlike
6、 arms, as well as her You Make It series of DIY light fixtures built from off-the-shelf parts. Im constantly searching for an economy of means, which is probably how most industrial designers think, she said. And because the form itself is minimal, the edges have to be perfect.As she has become more
7、 successful, Ms. Adelman has delved deeper into the minimal-artisanal approach. At the Salone del Mobile furniture fair in Milan this week, she introduced 25 candlesticks designed with flakes of cast brass sparingly affixed to sleek, barely tapered cylinders lathe-turned from walnut wood.Scott Fello
8、ws and Craig Bassam, owners of New Canaan, Conn. based furniture studio BassamFellows, also are faces of the movement. After two years in business in Switzerland, the partners moved back to the United States and brought their manufacturing with them for convenience. The company ultimately settled on
9、 carpentry and upholstery workshops in Lancaster County, Pa., which happened to be located near reserves of hardwood. All that proximity meant less travel for the designers. The local origins also helped convince retailer Design Within Reach to begin selling the duos sophisticated yet highly tactile
10、 ash and walnut Tractor Stools a year and a half ago.Independent studios and big companies alike are dialing up their made-in-America credentials. Since the mid-2000s, Minneapolis-based Room & Board has sourced approximately 90% of its inventory domestically. As of this year, all its wood collection
11、s are made in the U.S. A series of wood-banded pieces called Moro, previously imported from China, is now made in Vermont by longtime company supplier Lyndon Woodworking.One reason behind the American manufacturing boom is improved production conditions domesticallyor at least more difficulty elsewh
12、ere. Tyler Hays is the founder of the upscale brand BDDW, whose Philadelphia woodworkers and metalsmiths pair muscular wood elements with wabi-sabi bronze pedestals and casework. He said that falling wages in post-recession America have become competitive with increasingly pricey Chinese labor, and
13、that you can spend $4 in fossil fuel for shipping a $10 item overseas.Rich Brilliant Willing sells home furnishings it designs to match the capabilities of local fabricators. Its Delta lighting collection, for instance, is produced by a lamp-shade facility in New Jersey. The New York based company,
14、whose work has an improvised quality, also licenses its designs to manufacturers with overseas operations, but co-founder Charles Brill described this as a series of missed opportunities. Refinements get lost in translation, more quality controls are required, and time zones and transport schedules
15、delay prototyping and production.Overall, domestic costs have come down enough for BDDWs Mr. Hays to create more affordable furniture and home accessories, such as collapsible bookshelves and wood cutting boards for the wholesale company Lostine. Were making a bigger profit on pieces made in America
16、 than stuff made in China, and theres huge, huge interest at the Anthropologie price point, he said. The flash-sale website F also demonstrates the booming demand in this market segment. As of deadline, the online retailer was running sales of garden tools created by a Montana blacksmith and forged-
17、steel lighting made in Illinois that the site described as having an unpretentious, minimalist sensibility with a rough-hewn edge.David McFadden, chief curator of the Museum of Art and Design in New York, thinks such simplicity and sturdiness is a lingering response to the economics of the past few
18、years. Los Angeles based interior designer Ruth Storc, who writes the blog Design Patriot with her graphic-designer husband, Michael, agreed that the New American Minimalism captures a moment when conspicuous consumption is largely out of fashion. But she said these designs also embody the desire to
19、 support local economies.People are interested in all things artisanal, because they want to know where the things they live with are being made and by whom, she said. Perhaps there is a bit of a backlash against globalization and technology.F co-founder and chief creative officer Bradford Shane She
20、llhammer, a direct beneficiary of that modern technology, predicts the movement will last: Its hard to check responsible consumption at the door and go back to mass-produced things that have no stories to be told.Responsibility simply looks good, too. Kimberly Ayres, the San Francisco designer whose
21、 sunshiny interiors might seem at odds with the pared lines and visible mechanics of the new minimalism, embraces these furnishings precisely for their counterpoint quality. The basic yet refined lines allow more whimsical furniture pieces to stand out while, she said, the handmade quality is ground
22、ing.The versatility of minimal artisanship is what drove the recent partnership between Chicago carpet-tile company FLOR and Atlas Industries. The small Brooklyn manufacturer is perhaps best known for a modular wall-mounted storage system that, according to Atlas co-founder Thomas Wright, resists th
23、e economies of mass production. Atlas is furnishing a new chain of retail stores for the DIY flooring firm. Wrights partner, Joseph Fratesi, said that the functionality and character of their work gives customers a different experience of the built world.Jerry Helling, president of Lenoir, N.C.-base
24、d contract furnishings giant Bernhardt Designwhich is hosting a temporary gallery show entitled America Made Me during the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in New York next monthconcurs that American furniture design lately has embraced simplicity, craft and sustainability. He also notes th
25、at a planned-obsolescence attitude still pervades the American furniture industry, so we may soon see more ornate furniture again. Mr. Hays, of BDDW and Lostine, argues that American-made furniture is here to stay, no matter what stripe or style. Its green and good for the economy, he said. Local fits everybodys agenda.DAVID SOKOL
