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| Author's childhood home |
It’s hard to believe, but once upon a time rustic style décor was not cool. Some accounts say the country or rustic style of furnishings and home decorations started as early as 1840 during a period when there was a move – in some circles – toward primitive and back-to-nature.
My family was not in those circles. In 1840 we were part of the original rustic movement, homesteaders living in authentic sod houses with rough wooden furnishings. The modern rustic style began sometime in the 1970’s, apparently, (don’t quote me on that.) There was a move away from the sleek and plastic toward the natural and repurposed at that time that has only grown since.
It is still going strong, with a growing interest in nature-inspired themes and warm rustic colors and textures.
As someone who grew up surrounded by genuine rustic décor, like it or not, I am intrigued by this hunger for authentic, natural and time-worn surroundings. The real thing, in my experience, was too often accompanied by a lack of resources and amenities that many of us now take for granted. As children we used wooden crates (“orange crates”) as bedside tables or bookshelves. I put a board across two, tacked a gathered length of fabric around the ensemble and created my own dressing table. Rustic. But I really aspired to a new, shiny store-bought one.
What brought me, and so many others, back to an appreciation of rustic elements in our homes? Speaking only for myself, I think there is a deeper appreciation for my roots, for an earlier, simpler lifestyle, and one that appears – at this distance – to have had more depth and meaning. Handcrafted items speak of care and attention to detail, of things lovingly crafted for a specific purpose. Some items have the irreplaceable patina and glow of many years of use, whether it be the old wooden rolling pin made irregular and polished by generations of cooks, or the wooden kitchen table with the “distressed” look created by thousands of family meals and gatherings.
Now we buy things already “distressed,” made to look rustic on purpose. We once grabbed an old canning jar to hold our bouquet of wildflowers, since we had nothing else - now we buy one made for that purpose. Now that I can afford the glass vase, why do I choose the canning jar?
One of my first memories of beauty in home decor was of my mother’s pansies filling a plain wooden window box beneath the living room window. As you can see from the old photo above, we lived in a small house or cabin built of thick, wide Douglas fir planks. The shingles on the roof had been hand split and were probably of cedar. The window box was also of wide fir boards and no part of the house had ever seen a coat of paint, or ever would.
As a tiny tot, I stood next to the house wall and ran my hand over the grainy weathered wood of those twelve-inch planks. The texture, the color variations, the curve of the grain around a knot, all created a life-long impression as did my mother’s lace curtains against the small-paned windows, the pansies in the window-box. I know in my home furnishings I want to invoke that innocent time, the rustic cabin under the tall firs, the wooden door opening to a world of grass and flowers, and the taste of
It’s a cocoon, a safe, sweet place that is conjured up by rough wood floors, the scarred kitchen table, the fire in the fireplace. We wrap grandma’s old quilt around us, secure in the peace and security of…home.
We all need that, and with the world seeming to spin more out of control, rustic décor will continue to attract and resonate with many in spite of not having experienced the authentic pioneer lifestyle, or maybe because of not having experienced it.
C.S. Lewis wrote, “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”
It’s a good thing to create safe spaces, rustic spaces, for our modern selves. This longing for simple beauty, nature and peace is a good thing, but I suspect – and this is what C.S. Lewis was alluding to – it also stirs up an old yearning for something deeper, “…to find the place where all the beauty came from,” as he said elsewhere.
Perhaps rustic décor is actually pointing the way…home.
Margaret
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