It started decades ago with the slow-food movement. That morphed into the Farm to Plate movement and admonitions to "eat locally." With that sensibility raised, the movement inched inexorably forward to include those things we drink, leading to an explosion in local craft breweries.

"The growth in local brewers is directly related to farm-to-table, back-to-local movement," said Bill Heaton, co-founder of Big Elm Brewing in Sheffield MA. "People are really concerned with where their food and drink come from. And people are also back to the concept of supporting your town."

He explained the phenomenon. "One hundred years ago, everything you purchased came from your town—then we had strip malls and everyone traveled somewhere else to do their shopping. We can clearly see those going away with Amazon consuming our country. But now you see more emphasis on supporting local communities. With food, you see more people involved in CSAs, looking for food that has only traveled 40 miles rather than 200. And people are doing the same with what they drink."

Tom Crowell, co-founder of Chatham Brewing Company in Chatham NY agreed. "The whole buy-local movement blows over into beverages," he said. "You see it not only in craft breweries, but in local distilleries and cideries."

The nature of the craft beer drinker has changed over the years, however. Heaton said that in the 1990s, craft breweries were a "novelty." "It was a matter of who had the biggest flavor or the most alcohol. People wanted the newest, craziest beer."

He is encountering a more informed consumer. "Now people know whether they like a hoppy beer or they don't. And people are still experimenting—a whole thing with sour beers is becoming popular. Ten years ago, there was a really small niche of beer drinkers that liked sour beers. If you were a beer geek, you would check it off your list, but not really like it. Now, there are breweries that only make sour beers."

Craft breweries, wineries and distilleries fit nicely into the tristate culinary vibe, where restaurants tout chefs who work only with the finest local produce, where trips to local farms for pick-your-own adventures constitute summer entertainment, and where summer visitors browse farm markets for the ripest tomato or the plumpest ear of corn. But Crowell wonders about the future of the burgeoning brewing business.

"We are kind of a veteran in the craft brewing business," he said. "We have been here for 11 years and we have seen some peaks and valleys in the business. When we started there were a couple of breweries in Albany and in Hudson Valley, now every other week there is another opening."

"There are a lot of new little breweries—what they call nano-breweries. We will have to wait and see what happens with them—where they will find a comfortable size and whether they can make a living at the size they are. Are there enough craft consumers to support all the new craft breweries? I think we will have to look locally for customers."

Some of that has to do with the strict rules states impose on how alcoholic beverages can be distributed. Massachusetts, for instance, says that any beer imported from out-of-state must be handled by a distributor. This cuts Chatham Brewery out of the nearby Berkshires market, a fact that worries Crowell not at all. "We are comfortable where we are now," Crowell said.

The oldest community in the Berkshires, Sheffield, has one of the newer breweries, Big Elm Brewing. Bill Heaton said the decision to locate there had to do with the town's reception of his business proposal. He and his partner, Christine Heaton, looked for locations from North Adams to Sheffield. "Most towns didn't want a brewery," he said. "Everyone thinks they are big, stinky factories—which is not the case. When we found this location, I ran to the Town Hall and it was our best experience in the Berkshires. The town is very embracing and we love it."

Christine Heaton is the brewmaster, one of the very few women brewmasters in the U.S. "She was a chemist before she got her diploma as a brewmaster," said Heaton. "She is very talented—science heavy and brewer savvy. She comes up with the recipes."

The brewery is now five years old and distributes its wares state wide, in Rhode Island and in western Connecticut all the way to Long Island Sound, as well as through its local taproom. "People can come and sample, buy a pint and hang out," Heaton said. "We offer tours and are family and dog friendly. We do not serve food—that is the next phase—but only for limited things. We did the brew pub thing before and we don't want to be a restaurant."

Meanwhile, down in New Hartford CT, Chris and Christine Sayers are struggling to keep ahead of the phenomenal growth of their Brewery Legitimus. When they opened in 2016, Sayers said the brewery had "a decent capacity to handle growth." They are now moving toward their second expansion. Last summer they established a patio for patrons and the current expansion will nearly double their taproom and production area.

Sayer discovered brewing while living and studying in Belgium. He prepared for years, working for beverage distributors and for Duvel Moortgat, a Flemish family-controlled brewery, learning how ale is made. Later he took an MBA program at the University of Hartford.

"I was razor-focused," he said in a previous interview. "I was the guy who wanted to start a brewery and I was really getting my business plan down."

His attention focused on Connecticut, a state that was playing catch-up with the brewery boom. It is only a few years since Connecticut passed legislation allowing people to buy beer at a brewery. The brew-pub model allows sales through multiple streams of revenue," he said.

Sayers and his wife started building toward their business in 2010, deciding on Litchfield County as the right location. Their business model allows visitors to buy growlers of beer to drink onsite or take home and to experience flights of beers onsite to sample the taste of each of the styles brewed. Visitors can also bring in their own food and eat and drink at four large farmhouse tables. Food trucks are regularly onsite.

Some breweries in the region are:
Barrington Brewery
420 Stockbridge Road
Great Barrington MA
413-528-8282

Brewery Legitimus
283 Main Street
New Hartford CT
860-810-8894

Chatham Brewing Company
59 Main Street
Chatham NY
518-697-0202

Furnace Brook Winery
508 Canaan Road
Richmond MA
800-833-6274

Kent Falls Brewing
33 Camps Road
Kent CT
860-398-9645

Designer and antiques dealer Michael Trapp traces his current career to his early family experience.

"My parents couldn't let me take art in high school," he said. "It was a pent-up frustration that exploded in all directions."

Those directions include interior, landscape and architectural design, dealing in antiques and an architectural salvage business. "It's all basically the same kind of thing," he said, "except that I do both inside and outside design, which most people don't do."

His direction in life started early. His military family moved frequently before eventually settling in Ohio where he studied landscape architecture and design. His family was living in Nancy, France, though, when his mother demonstrated her interest in antiques. "There was no money for babysitters," he quipped, "so she would take me along. It was my first exposure to antiques."

It came at a good time. "During that time period, antiques dealers were more connoisseurs of what they selling and they shared the histories of what they had. Today, a lot of dealers are just brokering items and don't know the history behind what they have. Sometimes they are not even interested, which is kind of depressing."

And some buyers are the same. "They are just looking for something to fill a space—but who am I to judge," he said. "Everyone is different."

His job is to make sure that the items he offers for sale—or the items he installs if he is designing the room—are perfect for the spot. Trapp, who began collecting while still living in Ohio, travels the world looking for his treasures. For four months each year, he shuts his West Cornwall shop and goes on his odysseys—to Southeast Asia, India, Turkey, North Africa and Europe where he frequents the large antique markets in Avignon, France.

Today his West Cornwall showroom is packed with elements that can transform any room into a stunning presentation. "I buy things from all over the world and from different time periods," he said. "I love beautiful things—they don't have to be valuable, they just have to be beautiful."

He buys for specific projects or just because the item is appealing to him and his inventory ranges from jewelry to case furniture and everything in between. In the hands of the master, these items can be converted into elegant statements.

For years now, the common wisdom in the antiques trade has been that "brown is down." Young buyers are not interested in vintage furniture. But it is not an insurmountable obstacle for the dealer/designer.

"I think classic antiques are out of favor, but everything constantly recycles," said Trapp. "it's been an interesting summer—we've had a lot of young couples buying houses and buying odd and curious things for them. They seem to be more curious and not completely locked into a mid-century look. They are honestly interested and seem to be enjoying the experience."

He noted that items from different periods and sources can be melded together to create a new harmonious whole—he calls it juxtaposing "old with older to create a timeless environment." Greek pottery and ancient pottery from Turkey might cozy up with a collection of bones. Butterflies and insects can be displayed in antique frames, and vases beg to be filled with tall colorful coral.

Trapp takes on projects as on both sides of the Atlantic—he spent last week working in France and is leaving this week to oversee an installation in Delaware—but the majority of his work is done in the Hudson River valley, Berkshires and the greater New York area.

This cosmopolitan man maintains his headquarters in West Cornwall, while warehousing stock in Sharon, because of his marked preference for country living. "I've only lived in one city, Columbus" he said. "Cities are interesting and fun, but I don't what to live in one."

His shop, located at 7 River Road in West Cornwall, is open Saturdays and Sundays from 11AM to 5PM and during the week by appointment. Phone 860-672-6098 or visit this link www.michaeltrapp.com

Ian Ingersoll, renowned cabinetmaker from West Cornwall, is multilingual. "I love the classics, but I am tasked to work in the modern world" he said, "so I work in five different languages of modern design."

After 42 years in the woodworking business, his world is still unfolding. "You have to go where the market is," he said. "I have no idea what will be next."

Ingersoll began his odyssey when he built a house and its furnishings for himself after he got out of the Army. "Then some friends twisted my arm to make furniture for their apartment in New York and, by the time I was done with that, I was hooked."

The budding craftsman taught himself as he proceeded, quickly learning that the part he enjoyed most was the shop work. "I wanted to advance the art form and I looked around for an influence," he said. He found it in James Krenov (1920-2009), a master woodworker, who inspired his colleagues to bring simplicity, harmony and above all, a love of wood to their work. Krenov wrote two books, A Cabinetmaker's Notebook and The Impractical Cabinetmaker, in which be shunned ostentatious and overly sculpted pieces, stains, sanded surfaces,and unbalanced or unproportional constructions.

Ingersoll was inspired by Krenov's counsel, and "decided it would be smart for me to find an influence to grow through."

Enter the Shakers. "The Shakers represent our heritage," Ingersoll said. "[Their furniture] is in our houses and our museums. And because it was local, it was here for me to look at, touch and feel."
Also attractive to him were the pure lines of the furniture. "It is a Shaker religious directive not to include ornamentation," Ingersoll related. "They had simplified the lines of existing furniture, the form had been reinvented and redefined into simpler, less ornate, forms."

As Ingersoll taught himself the techniques needed for creating Shaker styles, he found a ready acceptance of his furniture. "I did a step-stool and put it in a village store," he said. "It sold that weekend. The next weekend, the buyer asked if I would make a chest. I didn't know how to do it, but said, 'Yes.'"

And his business proceeded from there. "The one single piece of useful advice I took from my father, was find something you love to do for a living," he said.

Four decades later, Ingersoll still works in the little village of West Cornwall in three small buildings, where he employs 10 people. "There is no 'up' from West Cornwall," he said. "How could we leave. I've never been without work through four recessions."

But to keep on top of his game, he must constantly improvise. He says he still gets requests for Shaker pieces, but now about 85 percent of his work is done for the hospitality industry.

"The learning goes on," he said. "I not only work in original designs, but also incorporate metal, stone, leather, plastic—whatever comes to hand. I show traditional pieces in Cornwall, but I'm working for the most cutting-edge design shops in New York. Everyone wants to continue learning."

He recently made furniture for the Four Seasons Hotel in Miami FL.

"We have to create as we go along," he said. "That's what allows the woodworking shop to survive when we have to compete with the Chinese, who sub-contract to Vietnamese, who will work for practically nothing. We create new and then have the proprietary rights for a year."

He does most of designing, but also collaborates with customers and designers—and even occasionally with a worker who brings something new to his attention.

He employs different woods when they have been out of the public eye for a while and when the price is right. For instance, American black walnut was hot for a while. "We reintroduced it," he said. "Prior to that, it had out-priced the marketplace, but by the early '90s, you could it buy at a quarter the price of other woods. That's one way we stay ahead of the curve, using something that had not been used. Now you see it everywhere, so we are using ash, which is a local hot wood. There is a glut of it and it is a good material."

He buys the majority of his wood product from dealers along the East Coast. If a wood is priced right, he then figures the right finish. He cites one time when he sold "a year's worth of furniture to Las Vegas" using a technique by which he rubs paint into the grain of the wood. "It's akin to liming," he said, "but more interesting because it accents the grain of the wood. In Las Vegas, we rubbed in gold paint."

"We have been able to reach from Japan to Canada—which is like bringing coals to Newcastle, with all the trees they have," he said.

Joy Brown is a presence that looms large on Broadway these days. No, she is not in an SRO play. Rather, nine of the sculptor's larger-than-life bronze figures, all exuding a Buddha-like serenity, are installed along the thoroughfare.

The exhibition, which has been extended through mid-February, is presented by Morrison Galleries of Kent and the Broadway Mall Association in cooperation with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation.

The rotund figures are installed from 72nd to 168th Street, greeting pedestrians crossing the street and subway riders emerging from below ground. "It's a thrill to see how warmly they are being received," said Brown. "People are always posting pictures of them on Instagram with kids crawling on them. It's almost like the sculptures are not complete until people interact with them."

"The Recliners," located at 166th St. Mitchel Square Park, seem to invite the viewer to lie down beside them on the grass for a leisurely chat—and that chat would even have a starting point. "In New York City life is so fast," the artist said. "People are living so fast, always on their cell phones. Then here are these big, peaceful, still figures. Sometimes I have little hidden words on them—it's like a little secret. On the Recliners, I said, 'Listen, be still, here we are, you and me.'"

The largest of the sculptures, "One Holding Small One," is on view at the West Sides Arts Coalition on 96th St. "People say, 'Oh, that is so great, a mother and child,'" she said. "But we are like a child when we are next to it. With all the stuff that is going on with the world and how cut off from nature we are, I wrote, 'Sweet Mother Earth, holding us all.'"

The large bronze sculptures are a relatively new venture for Brown, who has made her reputation as a clay artist. She grew up in Japan, the daughter of medical missionaries, and apprenticed there in traditional Japanese wood-fired ceramics.

Her work inevitably reflects the Japanese aesthetic instilled through her rigorous apprenticeship with the family of Ichino Toshio, a 13th generation potter in Tamba.

"During that time, I was required to make thousands of cups, never firing one," she recalled. "Submission to the demands of this process taught me technical skills, disciplined concentration and an understanding of and respect for the clay. It also taught me that my experience while working with clay is just as important as the finished piece. Whether it is a pot or a sculpture, ceramic or bronze, the piece will reflect the spirit in which it was made."

She carried this sensibility with her to Kent, here she built her studio and constructed a 30-foot-long Japanese-style wood-firing tunnel kiln (anagama). "A year of my work is fired at once, in an intense 24-hour-a-day, week-long firing," she said. "The resulting warm rich colors and rugged texture are gifts of heat and ash to the clay, bringing life to the unglazed forms."

In 1998, she co-founded Still Mountain Center, a nonprofit arts organization that fosters East-West artistic exchange.

"In the past, the size of my figures has been limited by the size of my kiln," she said. About 18 years ago, she started casting some figures in bronze, but was limited in their scope by the cost of reproducing them in metal.

Then, serendipity struck. For the past seven years she has been working in Shanghai several times a year in collaboration with Purple Roof Gallery and Atelier, a small studio and gallery dedicated to supporting contemporary artists. With the support of the gallery, the series of monumental bronze figures has been developed. The Broadway exhibition is its debut in the United States.

"Twenty years ago, I was working with an entrepreneur in Thailand, casting smaller pieces," she explained. "In 2008, he called from China, and said he was now connected with a Chinese [firm] and would I like to be part of big project."

Brown had always wanted to cast her figures in a larger format and jumped at the chance. "I took some of my smaller figures and they scaled them up. They made armatures and then I went over and changed them. It was so much fun to work there in that huge workshop. We stayed there and came to really get to know and love those folks over the seven years we've been making these big forms."

The Chinese firm has underwritten the costs of casting, recouping its money only when one has sold. "He's got $250,000 in production costs on Broadway," Brown revealed. "It's a huge gift."

In all, 13 works have been produced in editions of eight and a second exhibition is on view in China. "It's like a dual-city exhibition," said Brown. "These pieces have sisters over there sitting beside the ocean."

Brown's work has been exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States, Europe, and Asia, and has been featured in the New York Times, International Herald Tribune, Art News, House and Garden and Ceramics Monthly. She says her work has been influenced by artists as diverse as the creators of pre-Columbian figures, Japanese tomb figures and English sculptor Henry Moore.