I amassed quite an assortment of early 20th-century concrete faux-bois furniture at my house in Maine. This heavy, unusual, rustic, artisanal furniture adds a touch of whimsy to the rather formal arrangements of the mostly English antiques found throughout the house.
The house itself was constructed from blocks of hand-cut pink granite quarried on-site, and the faux bois reiterated the handcrafted look of the architecture.
I found most of the pieces at antiques shows. I bought planters, chairs, benches, luncheon tables and stands.
I put my first large table in the large “living hall.” It looked amazing there, and I decided that the gravitas of the piece was excellent in the house. I found a large bench, which was made in Texas by a third-generation faux-bois artist named Carlos Cortes. It turns out that faux bois has been a decorating tradition not only in France and Italy, but also in Japan, Mexico and Spain.
I visited Cortes in his open-air studio, a former automotive service station. Many Texas-style benches and tables were in the yard, and he showed me how he works on his projects.
His materials are simple (concrete, steel wire, rebar) and his tools are rudimentary (sticks, coarse brushes, rough abrasives).
We took a ride around the city to view his work and some examples of his family’s fine concrete structures, which have been a part of the San Antonio cityscape for decades.
The pieces are decidedly Southwestern in appearance — heavier, thicker and coarser than those I had purchased — but Cortes assured me he could emulate the wood graining and texture of the pieces I had in Maine.
We decided that he would create two dining tables, one large and one smaller, with pink granite terrazzo tops. These were delivered six months later. The tabletop and four bench tops are wood-grained cement.
The top alone weighs 1,200 pounds. It was a struggle to get the table into the hall. The crew had to build a ramp over the four stairs to get it into place. But the team did a masterful job and the table fits so well in the room.
The proportions are perfect, and the EZ Glide surface protectors on the feet actually allow me to move everything on the smooth wooden floors at will.
Address questions to Ask Martha, care of Letters Department, Martha Stewart Living, 601 W. 26th St., Ninth floor, New York, NY 10001. Send e-mail to mslletters@marthastewart.com.
2010 Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc.
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