Quality Wood Products As Antidotes to Disposable Culture
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Walnut island with dovetail drawers and bronze pull
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Walnut island with dovetail drawers
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Walnut trestle table
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Walnut trestle table
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Walnut trestle table

A 7-inch wood comb made of locally harvested German ash wood, cut and smoothed by hand in Germany by fourth-generation master comb makers. An Italian brush in ash. Poplar fruit crates hand-made by Pennsylvania Amish and stained in golden oak. These are the types of hand-made wood products, all of them modestly priced (under $50), each with a long, long back story, that have been selling at online retailer Kaufmann-Mercantile.

Now the retailer is commissioning a line of solid walnut and oak furniture: trestle tables, islands, benches, chairs. And at price points from $625 to more than $3,000. 

In its smaller household products, the descriptions are a tad pedantic and even overwrought, such as this write-up of an Italian birch hairbrush: "Widu means wood in Old English. A hairstylist in Milan invented the product to soothe the scalps and untangle the hairsprayed, blow dried, overworked and broken ends of the hair he worked with every day. The wood used in the bristles is hornbeam, a variety of birch wood found in Europe.

It's the same wood used in the pegs holding together giant windmills, proving to be trusted in strength. It would take a knot of epic proportions to cause one of the bristles to snap.

Commissioning its own line of hardwood furniture is a big step - and a welcome one.

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About the author
Bill Esler | ConfSenior Editor

Bill wrote for WoodworkingNetwork.com, FDMC and Closets & Organized Storage magazines. 

Bill's background includes more than 10 years in print manufacturing management, followed by more than 30 years in business reporting on industrial manufacturing in the forest products industries, including printing and packaging at American Printer (Features Editor) and Graphic Arts Monthly (Editor in Chief) magazines; and in secondary wood manufacturing for WoodworkingNetwork.com.

Bill was deeply involved with the launches of the Woodworking Network Leadership Forum, and the 40 Under 40 Awards programs. He currently reports on technology and business trends and develops conference programs.

In addition to his work as a journalist, Bill supports efforts to expand and improve educational opportunities in the manufacturing sectors, including 10 years on the Print & Graphics Scholarship Foundation; six years with the U.S. WoodLinks; and currently on the Woodwork Career Alliance Education Committee. He is also supports the Greater West Town Training Partnership Woodworking Program, which has trained more than 950 adults for industrial wood manufacturing careers. 

Bill volunteers for Foinse Research Station, a biological field station staddling the border of Ireland and Northern Ireland, one of more than 200 members of the Organization of Biological Field Stations.