Lifestyles: Gifts for artistic types

Foraged Flora is a moody feast for floral designers or anyone who wishes to fall under the spell of evocatively lit blossoms and leaves, stems and branches. Laurie Frankel, who shot the breathtaking photographs within, deserves a nod for her talent and keen eye. Moving chronologically through the year, each chapter offers large and small arrangements featuring seasonally available blooms. The dreamy visions displayed here may spur creative journeys, or at least open your eyes to a newly beloved flower. 

MODERN QUILTING
“It’s a guide of rustic sewing ideas for modern pioneers,” writes David Butler in Parson Gray Trade Quilts, a collection of quilt patterns that “celebrates reckless artistic abandon, for those of us not seeking perfection, but empowering curiosity.” The husband of designer Amy Butler, David specializes in “gritty techniques” such as staining, fading, dyeing and sandpapering the heck out of his materials to pleasing, distressed effect. 

CABIN FEVER
Seldom does the saying “Everything old is new again” apply to books. A notable exception can be found in Your Cabin in the Woods, by Conrad E. Meinecke. First published in 1947 as Cabin Craft and Outdoor Living, Meinecke’s guide to creating the ideal rustic domicile is written for “the novice who wants to play a big part in building his own cabin—who wants to be resourceful.” With its original retro illustrations and pages designed to appear aged, the book feels precisely matched to certain other recent old-is-new-again lifestyle trends. In other words, cozy up under a Pendleton blanket, spark some Paine’s balsam incense and enjoy this earnest paean to the great outdoors, which, in addition to cabin-building advice, contains tips for landscaping a wooded area, creating rustic furniture and cooking in the great outdoors.

TOP PICK IN LIFESTYLES
Though the subject matter isn’t identical, I can’t help but think of comedian, woodworker and guy-who-played-Ron-Swanson Nick Offerman’s newest book—following the successful Paddle Your Own Canoe and Gumption—as the modern-day corollary to Your Cabin in the Woods, at least while I’ve got them side by side. Both books advocate a close relationship with wood; both stretch from there to explore the accouterments of such a life; both sparkle—in a manly fashion—with the charm of their author’s personalities. Upon opening Good Clean Fun to a random page, I found a tongue-in-cheek Beard Length Virility Chart. That might tell you everything you need to know. If not? Here’s where you learn how to make whisky coasters, a “scrappy birdhouse,” a “slumber jack bed” and even a kazoo. These and other projects are contributed by Offerman’s woodshop buddies and family members, packaged up with much mirth, fun collage illustrations and what Offerman calls “wood porn.” Woodworking craftmanship cannot get more fun than this.

This article was originally published in the December 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.