Heck Yes Craft

Meg Little loved to doodle as a teenager, and you can see it in her work today: vibrant rugs that look like they've been lovingly sketched with colored pencil. See a sampling of the rugs she's been making for 20 years above. But visit her website too, to see the whole gamut and to read a wonderful selection of thoughts about life, human needs, creativity, and the handmade. Here's a sample passage: "For thousands of years now, we've been using the same symbols: spirals, squares, dots, rings, to communicate, powerfully, below consciousness.

I'm pretty sure if I were left alone with Penelope Rakov's Penny Candy Necklace I would end up breaking a tooth. Seriously: The Philadelphia-based studio glass artist's murrini jewelry is so deliciously detailed and colorful, it gives new meaning to the term eye candy.

Wharton Esherick, the "Dean of American Craftsmen," fancied himself as a sculptor who worked primarily in wood. The Expressionist leanings of his early furniture and sculpture matured into softer, organic forms that still look quite modern. I love the sculpted yet functional look of his furniture, and you can pick out the influence of his aesthetic in following generations of furniture builders.

"Always wanting you, but never having you, makes it hard to face tomorrow," crooned country legend Merle Haggard. I feel his pain as I drool over Lisa Sorrell's incredible handmade cowboy boots - wearable art that, for now, I can only afford to ogle. She builds each boot by hand, then collaborates with her customer to create a design inspired by vintage patterns but infused with the personality of the wearer.

Ashley Vick's line of handmade metal jewelry is named after her great-grandmother, Filomena DeMarco--a nod to history and heritage also reflected in her work. Vick creates statement pieces that feel like a modern-day version of the heirloom jewels you might dream of inheriting from a relative or finding tucked away in the attic of an old house.