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A piece of well-crafted furniture in something like Pine or Hickory is rustic because the natural wood is rustic, or at least informal. Slapping on paint, slathering it with varnish or distressing it with chains or whatever makes it crap IMHO.
I liken it to the "barnwood" pieces I see that have the fresh-cut wood showing and are assembled with drywall screws. Mega kludge.
If I had 8 hours to cut down a tree, I'd do it in 15 minutes with a chainsaw and drink beer the other 7:45 hrs.
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Quote:
Probably means different things to different people, but to me it conjours up images of grandma's house. Basically simple furniture, much of it not mass produced or even store bought, that was solid, but old and showing considerable wear.
That's the "look" they are trying to achieve. But to do it properly you need a basic, but solid, piece of furniture, and let a couple of generations of kids loose on it for ~50 years. Trying to mass produce it with MDF? Yeah, that's just rubbish.
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Pink Floyd said:
A piece of well-crafted furniture in something like Pine or Hickory is rustic because the natural wood is rustic, or at least informal. Slapping on paint, slathering it with varnish or distressing it with chains or whatever makes it crap IMHO.
I liken it to the "barnwood" pieces I see that have the fresh-cut wood showing and are assembled with drywall screws. Mega kludge.
It is not a new trend. I took apart many a barn to salvage the siding so my dad could install it in people's homes back in the late 1960s through some of the 1980s. We would carefully peel the boards off and stack them on a trailer with straw between them and haul them home. Lay them out face up in the sun to weather any scratches. Then sticker them in the barn with rags between the. Back then my dad got $5-10 bd ft installed on walls or ceilings for that stuff. If often went into houses that were loaded with antiques.
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John Mihich said:
It's the new fad -
Country. Early American, Primitive, Early Shaker, and all the other "country look" was "in" about 35 years ago. Then American wives fell in love with WHITE, every darn piece of anything in almost every house was pure white, now that I hated. But it made MDF the trim of Carpenters around the world, and with it all expertise in trimwork fell at least 30%. Mdf BONDO for the sloppy joints, and WHITE paint. Sheesh. If country is coming back enough to have a thread about it, I like that, at least half the wood work was stained, dyed, or at least painted something other than WHITE. Back in the day there were those who made a fine living "distressing" furniture pieces, and in some cases those proclaiming to be eggspurtz in early Am furniture were duped by their work. But it was also an era of caveat emptor, because there were dishonest "antique" dealers amok, and if you had the cash, and no sense of what you were looking for a lot of folks bought authentic made in 1980 pieces they thought were from 1822. Wild wild West at it's finest 
Worst thing they can do is cook ya and eat ya 
GW
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Good solid, old furniture; well-worn, traditional woods; and refinished "natural" or even painted carefully-- a good thing, even attractive. Sloppy paint and junked up - curbside for me, like something that came out of my kid's college dorm.
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I wish my daughter-n-law would read this. She has requested a "country rustic" trestle dinning room table built with extra heavy salvaged lumber. I would really enjoy doing it in walnut, but that will not do!
My fear is the fad will fade about the time I get it delivered.
"I tried being reasonable..........I didn't like it." Clint Eastwood
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I think a point that you allude to is that fads and trends in the furniture and decorating world are the antithesis of quality and value, regardless of style. Right now Country Rustic may be hot, but tomorrow it will be something else and it will be the same crap, just with a different coat of paint on it. Just about any style can be done well. It won't suit all tastes, but that doesn't mean it can't be good quality.
If you are going down a river at 2 mph and your canoe loses a wheel, how much pancake mix would you need to shingle your roof?
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Bill Wilson said:
I think a point that you allude to is that fads and trends in the furniture and decorating world are the antithesis of quality and value, regardless of style. Right now Country Rustic may be hot, but tomorrow it will be something else and it will be the same crap, just with a different coat of paint on it. Just about any style can be done well. It won't suit all tastes, but that doesn't mean it can't be good quality.
This!
If I had 8 hours to cut down a tree, I'd do it in 15 minutes with a chainsaw and drink beer the other 7:45 hrs.
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I have to confess, I scanned the responses ever so briefly. Add my voice to the voices of those who don't like it. Some of the replies said very nearly what I would say...junk, garbage, trash, etc.
There is a thing that can be considered country, or rustic. I like that stuff. I actually really, really like that stuff. Then we have the foolish articles that you're referring to. I did distressed furniture for years, and I didn't care for it. This absurd, chic, crap that is described variously as rustic or primitive is a whole new low.
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I have a friend that buys furniture at a Goodwill outlet store for ~$2 each piece, takes it home, sands a bit, put on some paint and sells it at an "antique mall" for a couple hundred bucks as shabby chic. Not where I want to invest my time but it keeps her busy and some otherwise landfill stuff gets recycled. And yes her house has "stuff" in every crevice.
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