After fifteen years spent in the beach services industry, carting chairs and umbrellas day-in and day-out, Brad McDowell became unusually familiar with the flaws of cheap construction. Low-grade materials, paired with 248 days of sun, sand, saltwater, meant that McDowell and his Santa Rosa Beach, Florida, staff spent the majority of the down season fixing chairs. In 2012, McDowell started Sunrise Chair Co. with the simple goal of building a chair that could stand up to the elements.

Judging from the slew of serving carts, free-standing bars, and bottle-friendly armoires at last week’s High Point market, it seems home entertaining is more popular than ever. Held bi-annually in High Point, North Carolina, the market offers a sneak peek at new furniture designs, which means home bartenders will have lots of options this year for serving spirits in style. 

Brothers Rehan and Josh Nana have spent thirty years chasing quail and pheasant on their family’s three-hundred acre ancestral farmland in Missouri. The only problem? With nothing but derelict barns and abandoned outbuildings on the property, the brothers had nowhere to bed down for the night. “We’re from Kansas City originally,” Rehan says, “so when we were younger, Josh and I would load up some barbecue and drive out for the day. But we didn’t have a place to stay, which made for some long drives home.” 

On a recent antiquing excursion to Charleston's Six Mile Antique Mall, I was drawn to the back corner by a cluster of jewel-encrusted handbags. Wild with color and whimsical drawings, the purses had a kitschy glamour that had me hooked from several strides away. When I got close enough to read the words painted on the front of each bag–Money Tree, Road Runner, Humdinger–I realized I’d stumbled on the work of a designer with a sense of humor. Her name was Enid Collins.