From the Source

This past weekend we finally decided to check out a furniture store that my friend (and neighbor), Judy had told me about.  Its called From the Source, and its located in Greenpoint, Brooklyn – only 7 miles from my apartment.  They specialize in custom hand made furniture using FSC-certified, plantation-raised, and reclaimed woods (all imported from Indonesia).  Everything has a beautifully rustic, yet modern feel.

Not only is the furniture absolutely beautiful, but the shopping experience is really amazing too.  When you go to the Greenpoint location, which is their design studio and warehouse, you enter into a showroom filled with finished pieces of furniture.  But most of the fun shopping happens in the huge warehouse in the back.  When we told the sales representative that we were looking for a dining table, she brought us into the warehouse where you could choose from rows and rows of wooden slabs, much like the ones below:

Unfortunately many of these slabs were out of our price range ($1100 – $1500), but they did have more affordable alternatives.  We ended up buying a $400 table top.  It cost less because rather than using a solid slab of wood, it was made up of strips/planks of leftover scrap Sonokeling (Indian Rosewood), framed in steel.  It’s still absolutely beautiful since the Sonokeling has a clear varnish which allows the natural pale white and espresso wood grain to shine in all its glory.

The next step was to pick out a base for the slab.  Our sales person picked out a couple possibilities for us and we ended up going with two of the WIF (wireframe) Bases (sold separately). We also got to talk to the guy who would end up attacheing the base to the table.  He explained to us what he was going to do, and we got to choose the exact positioning.  In the end, it was not an inexpensive table, but it was significantly less that what you’d end up paying at a Crate and Barrel or Pottery Barn….and its much more unique.

I can’t say enough how much I enjoyed shopping at From the Source.  Our salesperson was wonderfully helpful and accommodating and really took her time to help us figure out what was right for us.  There was so much more there I wish I could buy and I had so much fun just wandering the vast warehouse.  I also fell completely in love with a set of dining chairs, but unfortunately, they are way out of our price range. I think its going to be a challenge to find cheap chairs that live up to the beauty of our new table so I’m thinking about just getting something solid black and understated.  It’ll match well enough, but won’t draw any attention to its inferiority.

Anyway.  Our new table JUST arrived last night.  Its a small four seater (squeezes 6) since we are limited on space.  I love it so much!!!

I actually wish it could have been a little bit longer, but the short length allows us to eventually fit a small buffet onto the back wall if we decide we want that. We also realized we have to move our ceiling lamp - it's not centered above the table. Gonna have to hire someone to do that....OH, also, those are my cheap IKEA chairs that I've had since college. I definitely plan to replace those at some point.

I can't believe wood can grow like this naturally. So beautiful!