Adventures with the Scout Plein Air Box

In the beginning of September, I (Walter) felt the call of adventure, packed my Scout Plein Air Box and art supplies, a few changes of clothes and set out – this time a little further from home. An early morning Uber drive, two plane rides across the country, and a 4-hour van trip later, I found myself in the high country of Yosemite National Park, with a 50 lb pack on my back accompanied by three fellow adventurers and our guide. We were on a 5-day hike into the wilderness to escape the crowds of people and the endless demands of our busy lives, to camp under millions of stars that illuminated the night sky, to swim in the refreshingly freezing lakes fed by melting snow, to climb Vogelsang Peak, and for me to plein air paint.

Finding a nice spot to paint

Vogelsang is the one on the left

Painting by Fletcher Lake

The sunrise

 

A journal entry during the trip

I saw a bear yesterday! We were sitting drinking coffee and in the distant clearing a bear was moseying up the hill towards the lake. I burst out, “There’s a bear, there’s a bear!” We all jumped up and followed him. For a moment we lost him in the brush and when we got to the lake, he had somehow crossed from the left side of us to the right and he was super close! Preoccupied with breakfast, his head was down in the water. Occasionally he popped up with a mouthful of small fish. Chomping away, he looked around slowly then got back to snacking. When the water hole no longer proved satisfactory to his appetite, he turned away from us and went further into the reeds. We could see the tops of the tall grass shaking and hear the water splashing. He seemed to be having a grand time!

After breakfast we packed our day bags. With a few snacks, a rain jacket, and my paint box, I was ready. We set out through the meadow over a creek and began to climb a winding trail up to Vogelsang Lake. After a quick swim, we continued the trek to Vogelsang Summit. The going was steady but gradually slowed as the path steepened. When we reached the pass, we transitioned into rock scrambling. Loose gravel made for unsteady steps, and I stuck to boulder hopping, avoiding the gravely path as much as possible. On the final ascent we trail blazed through thick low piney brush. We bushwhacked our way up, intermittently discovering a patch of bare rock only to lose it again under the gnarly needled thicket.

The last few feet we had to hoist ourselves up onto rock ledges using the cracks as holds. As we scrambled up the final rock the world opened around us. Below lay a vast array of granite peaks dotted with ice melt lakes. The pine trees stitched each mountain together and the range went on as far as our eyes could see, disappearing into the hazy horizon. We could see Half Dome jutting up from the rest, completely bald, a formidable hunk of granite! We sat up on that razor edge ridge for a while and I attempted to capture the land below with my paints, brushes and canvas. During the descent we stopped at Vogelsang Lake for a late lunch and an invigorating swim before heading back to camp. What a day! How amazing life can be!

Rock scrambling

Painting atop Vogelsang

Leaving Vogelsang Summit

The Bear!

Vogelsang Lake in the distance

First painting of the trip

Right outside my tent

Goodnight!

Coming Soon: Postcards and Prints of the Yosemite National Park Plein Air Paintings!

Toulomne Meadows

Vogelsang Summit

Fletcher Lake

The view from my tent

The Scout Plein Air Box: A Backstory

The Scout Plein Air Box was inspired by our endeavor to make art every day. Each one is handmade in our West Chester, Pennsylvania workshop. It compactly secures all of your essential art supplies for painting outdoors. Fill your box with your favorite colors, paintbrushes, and sketchbook. Find your spot and quickly transform the box into a mini studio. Set it on a flat surface or mount it on a tripod, snap the liquid jars, brush holder, and easel in place, clip on your canvas and you are ready to paint. Read our earlier blog post for more of the Scout's story, or dig into its features and uses with our video walkthrough!

Happy New Year!
“Turn it and turn it,
for everything is in it.”
–Ben Bag Bag

Growing and flourishing are not always analogous.

Join us for a quick wander through 2023, the year we smallened Peg and Awl, and moved out of Philadelphia. Also the year where we found ourselves finding ourselves again. The ‘smallening’, as I’ve been calling it, is a bit vague. I’m an open book when it comes to most things, and would love to engage in conversation on the topic, but mostly, I know neither where to begin, nor how to distill it. The simplest version is this: Peg and Awl was a thriving small business with twenty-five people at our height, reaching sales numbers we’d never imagined nor planned for. But the joy of having a small business, being curious, and exploring this weird world with family and friends, became secondary as our responsibilities to maintain this monster perpetuated. Somehow growing and flourishing are not always analogous.

And here we are in 2024, returning, already, to what matters most! We’ve ventured south for a little warmth and a lot of biking, I went north for a mini retreat in the snow. We’ve been working on new Peg and Awl treasures, building our barn storefront and workshop, and working on the land.

We cannot wait to share our progress – there are so many stories to tell!

Our 14th Anniversary was January 10th!

Søren and Silas made me a bunch of Specimen Cards of the Five Acre Wood for Christmas!	I continue to fill sketchbooks and journals, and am designing some new books and journals that will be available soon!

One of the most thrilling parts of 2023 was finally launching our long-in-the-works Solvitur Ambulando ring – and with much success! We appreciate all of your shared stories. Thanks to Claire of Warwick Furnace Farm for modeling for me!

 

We opened up our barn shop which we look forward to stocking with Peg and Awl treasures and more. We are heading to New Orleans for the NAMTA show in March!	We made new treasures out of Sendak scraps, and small batch colours, a puzzle of a kind!

We spent a week on a cargo ship during a storm on the North Sea – there were two visible twisters at one point! By the fourth day a calm settled over the sky, and the water, and the few floating birds, and we jumped into the cold sea. (no showers on board!) 

So often I wish to jump back in, to return to the cold depths in that utter post-storm quiet. We went from thinking we’d made a big mistake in booking this trip, to longing to do something like this again – such a harrowing and magical adventure!

Here in Whitby England, where we wandered in the glorious and misty rain.	Before the storm and the reality of our upcoming adventure, Walter painted and Søren drew. ps: Walter began to work on a larger Scout!

We discontinued 3/4 of our catalog – both daunting and freeing! Inevitably, once we sell out, the inquiries start pouring in. We still have some Rogues and Weekenders and more available in our Last Chance! section.
(Here, in Amsterdam on gigantic rented bikes!)

Søren, Silas, Pearl, and I moved our studios back into the cozy Springhouse!	We opened our barn for the Chester County open studio tour. Come visit us May 18 and 19!

We traveled! Here we are, on the other side of our wild cargo boat trip after wandering down the coast of England. We spent a quick couple of days in London!

We cold plunged in Virginia when it was 29 degrees outside and were tingling and spectacularly warm when we climbed out onto the previously cold rock to shake off.	Walter bringing flowers over to the barn to brighten the wet and wintry gloom.

Solviture Ambulando (It is solved by walking)! A Christmas Eve post dinner walk and view of the Peg and Awl Barn from the street.

I started 2024 with a retreat with my friend, Deb, in CT during a snowstorm! Making progress of a kind on a project. I share bits on my Substack and @beingmargauxkent	We did a few shows – here we are at Wintherthur, which we shall partake in again in 2024!

One of our last family photographs in our Philadelphia workshop!

* * *

Everywhere, Astonishments!

I was working on this newsletter at Lentil & Co, and this song came on. It comes and goes as songs do, but this one every time, crawls into that place where only certain songs crawl.

No Hard Feelings by The Avett Brothers

Planting in a Post-Wild World	The Comfort of Crows

HOME, AGAIN.

Walter and I started Peg and Awl on the 10th of January, 2010. My journal – which was blank – suggests nothing miraculous. Last night’s power outage from yesterday’s deluge means a coffee shop in-between which rouses the unexpected, always. As I walked and wrote in my new journal*, the in-between felt grounding, as each footfall, each letter, and the sun warming despite the cold, settled me. 

I was thinking that we should share a timeline of Peg and Awl successes, but it occurred to me as I walked, to share bits of the in-between days instead.

Thank you for being here!

• Our Shop! We recently opened it up to visitors for a few days with great success – we met so many wonderful people, which reinforces how lucky we are to connect, through Peg and Awl, to such humans. 2024 will see our shop filled with new treasures from us along with treasures made by others. We are heading to NAMTA in New Orleans in March, on the hunt for art materials.
  
  
• Journals and Kits and Tutorials! We’ve been working on some unusual new designs and look forward to sharing them.
  
  

• Of A Kind Collections (accompanied by more Flea Market adventures)
  
  
• New Collaborations, New Colours, and New Found Treasures!
  
  

	2009   Before starting Peg and Awl, I had a little slow and steady business called The Black Spot Books. I made journals and jewelry and a gathering of my favourite scraps lead me to make the tiniest books, which I eventually strung together into the Library necklace. Boing Boing featured it, making it my first experience with spiraling, viraling.

2010 We started out making treasures for our Philadelphia Row Home, including our Tub Caddy out of reclaimed wood and materials gathered from nearby construction sites. At that point, people were thrilled that we were rescuing the materials from them or the deconstruction sites, saving them time and money with trips to the dump.

	2011   Now with two boys and a business, and needing a diaper bag that wasn’t paislied, flowered, or pre-gendered, we decided to make a bag that would suit all of us. Thus, the first Peg and Awl bag – The Tote – came to life! This may be when we realised we could keep making things first for ourselves, and then for others.

2014   The Black Spot Books and the early days of Peg and Awl treasures were mostly comprised of reclaimed and found materials. As our business evolved, we started using new materials for a variety of reasons, primarily as a shortage of reclaimed materials arose. In our first couple years, we decided to officially launch our Of a Kind collections which harkened back to those early days.

2016   I went to Spain for Picture Camp, a picture book workshop with my art supplies in various pouches and bags. On the way home, realizing i needed something more conducive to traveling, I started to design an artist roll unlike any artist rolls I could find at the time — one that would hold a variety of art materials, could hold small necessities in a zip pouch, as well as small notebooks. Thus, our most popular treasure to date — The Sendak — was born!

2019   Walter, feeling compelled to find his way back to making art as well, went to a painting workshop lead by Jeremy Mann and Nadezda in Tuscany, Italy. On the supply list was a plein air box. Not knowing what this was, Walter ignored it and found himself taping his canvas to his hand to paint. Thus began his developing of the Peg and Awl Scout Plein Air Box!

	2023   Growing weary of Philadelphia and the business success story of growinggrowinggrowing, we sold our Philadelphia workshop and moved everything to our land in West Chester, rebuilt the dilapidated barn, set up shop, and are now enjoying our new adventure!

2024   Journals! I am always eager for change and currently working on new journals*, tutorials, and kits for Peg and Awl. If you’ve been following along, I started this unusual creature a few years ago, and they are nearly ready for take off! This one I made for my friend Deb, using her Pinocchio illustrations on the cover.

Just Yesterday

When the power went out, we found a box of unused Hannukah candles, sunk them into decade old organic black rice and farro, and lit our way through a few rounds of one of our favourite games, reminiscent of The New York Times’ Connections, Code Names! Søren and I started out strong with Roadtrips for 5.

Workspace:

Sophie Blackall’s, Milkwood in New York, Photograph by Sophie.	Our Cabin in CT, photograph by Deborah Stein.

A salvaged flat file turned standing desk! A beloved new corner of my studio. 

 

Everywhere, Astonishments!

The Flynn Effect and “kids these days...”

I don’t know about you, but I hear a lot of mischief about kids these days and see a lot of memes that don’t make a whole lot of sense to me.

This morning in Turk’s Head Coffee Shop in West Chester, Penna, there was a young person – he must have been 5 – who sat near us and lit up upon seeing a gigantic book of maps on the table and immediately asked “Where is Israel? Where is Japan?” as he navigated the book’s systems. “Mommy, I want to go to Japan.” She considers then realizes he means Japan in the book. Pages turn. “Where is Taiwan. What is this island? Georgian Bay, Ontario. Lake Superior. Where is Minnesota?”

He reads and pronounces places I am still learning, and goes on to explain what makes 75 an interstate.

I could have sat and listened all day, but I had to go fetch my own two creatures, full of wonder, curiosity, and magic. I wanted to leave my name and number, to connect this 5 year old map lover to my 13 and 15 year old map lovers. But maybe they aren’t unusual, these curious young people. Maybe they are everywhere.

Leave us a comment!
–Margaux

Back to School!

“I will draw in class!”

Søren and Silas have always been draw-ers, and that they draw has always felt like a good thing to us. But when they went to public school, (and me before them), the message was different: drawing is distracting, or it shows you aren’t listening, or, just don’t draw because I said so!*

My guys actually had a relatively good public school experience, but this message persisted. When six year old Søren came home one day and told us that he was punished for drawing, we decided to do a little Back to School campaign with our recently launched desk caddies, chalk tablets, pouches, and journals. Søren partook in a magical alternative version of the punishment writing lines with “I will draw in class.”

I still love this.

That was then, this is now. We have been homeschooling for five years, which means that our creatures have a lot of free time to do what they love, as homeschool is very rarely (if at all) all of us at a table with textbooks and lined paper.⁠⁠ Søren, 15, is now dual enrolled in our local community college. Dual enrollment is open to most high-schoolers in America and very common for Homeschoolers.⁠ His first class is drawing!

As a family, we tend to go against a lot of currents in our world, and are fortunate to have built our own business, which gives us the freedom to do so. We’ve shared fragments of our recent decision to smallen Peg and Awl and move from a massive city building on an acre of land to our barn in Chester County, but I haven’t yet articulated on paper or screen, the whole of it – if there is a whole of it. My exhaustion of the words efficiency and busy certainly played a role. But here, the new-to-me word salutogenesis comes to mind.

Simply put, we smallened Peg and Awl for our mental and physical well being. We started Peg and Awl as a way to adventure and bring objects to life, and we ended up becoming managers of a business much bigger than expected. In smallening, we are gaining our freedom to make and explore once again.

Let us remember The Lorax:

“I went right on biggering… selling more Thneeds. And I biggered my money, which everyone needs.”
–Dr. Seuss

If you have any questions, I’d love to try to answer them. Perhaps here is where I open a Q+A. I think our story is an interesting one, unfamiliar, but also the kind of story that is gaining confusing and wondrous commonality these days, so I’d love to share!

*after sharing this on IG, some delightful souls came forth telling their stories of how they encouraged drawing in their classes. Absolutely not to be missed – there are always exceptions!

Shop Our Shop!
 

I will draw in class.	I will too.

Our Pouch Collection

A Poem by 7 year old Søren.	Anselm Bookbinding Kits

Our Desk Caddies

The Sendak Artist Roll

See Søren’s work here!

Everywhere, Astonishments!

99% Invisible Podcast: Roman talks with Brian Merchant, author of Blood in the Machine, about the Luddites – a story that I, along with so much of the world – have misunderstood! PS: I first learned about them a little over a decade ago at a museum in Philadelphia that also had the story all wrong. I am on a wildly swinging pendulum around the conversation of AI, and this was the most compelling connection for me yet.

The Doctor’s Farmacy Podcast about Function Health: the other side of the efficiency conundrum! What is wrong with our healthcare system, and how we cannot seem to abandon the stuck channels for costs and fear of the unknown, and how Function Health is aiming to redirect our understanding of ourselves as impacted by the common standards of living, eating, &c. into a healthier future!

Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones: We all enjoyed the first episode, as Dan Beuttner, a familiar name in our house, visited Okinawa and some of their many centenarian inhabitants.

​Tin Type by Tyler Scaife 2011/2012. Tyler was one of our first employees and he helped us build the first woodshop (that we are standing in front of) in the backyard of our Philadelphia row home. Søren and Silas are here too, a blur, for the exposure was 45 seconds!

Our 13th Anniversary!

Walter and I started Peg and Awl on the 10th of January, 2010! According to my journal – which was blank – it was just a day like any other day. Though I’ve always kept a journal, I didn’t commit daily; a blank page now would absolutely denote a different kind of day! But as I sit, my butt pained by the raised root of this old Norway Spruce overlooking a cemetery on a seriously misplaced spring day, I think about how everyday is just another day, and too, how no days are just another day. It is perplexing, this life. Each day is a day to start something new, or a day to simply be. I am trying both.

–January 2020

Thank you for being here!

Walter and I write every newsletter and blog post, should you wish to reach out to us!

Though we forgot our anniversary date, we are daily grateful that the things we love to dream up, make, and use are enjoyed by others too – it keeps our creativity, spirits, and business going!

2023 will see us meandering off of familiar paths into unknown territory. A disruption is in order! Until then...

Some Things to Look Forward to in the Coming Year!

• New Website! We’ve been working on it for a long time – we don’t have a launch date yet, but soon!
• New Jewellery! If you’ve been following along on Instagram – you may have seen some glimpses of these projects over the past few years.
• New Of A Kind Adventures! (accompanied by more Flea Market adventures, read here!)
• Exciting Pivots!

Our Workspaces Through the Years!

The Backyard Shoppe (2010–2012) Photograph by Chris Crisman	The Peg and Awl House ​(2010–2019)

The Atlas Casket Factory (2012–2017) Photograph by Parikha Mehta	The Current Shoppe (2016...) This is where our treasures are made!

The Barn at the Five Acre Wood (2022...)

Read about the Barn Renovation Project, here!

I’ve been moving around The 5 Acre Wood looking for spot that is just right! Here I am in my first studio, which will sooon be a gallery space and showroom!

A view of The Barn from the woodland.	Walter’s loft studio in the barn.

A portrait of our family when we first moved here – we are due for a new one...

Walter takes his Scout Plein Air Box everywhere!	As for me, journals and Sendaks are my constant companions.

 

Some Good Things

“A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.”
–Robert Greene

• Podcast: The full quote is so much more exciting than this misunderstood snippet. Have a listen to this episode of Simon Sinek’s A Bit of Optimism – he interviews the TSA head of socal media – Janis Burl. What a thrilling conversation about interruptions and zig zags! 

• Currently Reading: Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl

Our Start of Year Travels

How New Years come around so quickly, these new years. 2022 was another weirdo, and we look forward to new and very different adventures, and too, very same adventures in 2023.

“If you like to write or draw or dance or sing, do it because it’s so great: as long as we’re playing around like that, we don’t feel lonely, and our hearts warm up.”
–from The Woman Who Killed the Fish by Clarice Lispector 

Søren drawing in his Anselm Sketchbook.	Walter drawing in his Standard-Sized Harper Journal.

This morning I awoke in Florida, but I didn’t just arrive here and wake up and wonder, “where am I?” and discover, “oh, Florida!” No, we’ve been driving for days because cars are on roads with limits and not in the sky making endless paths, swarming around like insects or birds. On a road that should take us from Point A to Point B in 4 hours, took 8 or 12. But we’ve been listening to Tom Hanks read The Dutch House by Ann Patchett – time is suspended and none of us are disgruntled, but we stop the car and stretch and walk and that helps time confuse us all the more.

This morning I crawled out of our camper and into the damp and still dark of Florida. In the morning darkness, which is lighter than nighttime darkness, I spied Spanish Moss above, dripping excess moisture onto me, and welcoming me to this new, strange place. What better way to go into the new year than this? My family sleeping a few feet away, new plants’ hellos. “Hello plants!” I am grateful for this exploration, and for this world of weirdness that is the same, but different, always, and always.

Autumn Colors: The Keeper Pouch	One of our campsites!
The Watson Serving Tray	Myakka River State Park

My Finch Satchel filled with art supplies!
Fort Clinch, Florida	6” Anselm Bookbinding Kit

The Sendak Mini Artist Roll
The Maker Pouch	Our On-the-Go Collection

O’Leno State Park, Florida
Hand-Bound Leather Tome	Autumn Colors: The Small Hunter Satchel

  

Last Chance Classics!

There is a lot leaving our shop, we know! In an attempt to alleviate the confusion, we've marked listings with Last Chance. Whilst some of the options are sold out, our drop down menus show what still have in stock and ready to ship!

The Marlowe Lunchbag	Apothecary Caddy

Desk Caddy with Quote	Large Waxed Canvas Tote

  

Reminder: Some Colors are Leaving

We still have some almond bags in stock and ready to ship, along with the two other discontinued colours, Radish and Rook!

The Small Hunter Satchel	The Rogue Backpack

The Gatherer Bag	The Reader

My Warwick Weekend.

Last month I spent a weekend at the Warwick Furnace Farm for a much needed impromptu escape with Claire Rosen (one of the farm’s sisters) and Emma Mierop of Skippy Cotton. We planned to take our worlds apart and put them back together again, but we only got as far as:

Taking our worlds apart over snacks and long lavender soaked discussions,
going for a long walk on a cold, star bright night,
understanding that a thing taken apart nearly always reveals more than expected, and therefore takes longer to put back together,
and nebulous plans for a next time.

I also made some pretty classic Margaux messes everywhere I went. Claire seemed unbothered. See my dribblings and droppings below:

I do have a LOT of the things we make with me when I go anywhere. We make them to use them and use them I do! Here is my Sendak and my nearly finished Large Tome.	I awoke first and did my morning pages in Claire’s time-travely kitchen – oh, to be somewhere else is such a luxury!

 

 

I love our radish canvas color, but we are discontinuing it to make space for new things. I have a variety of our radish bags, 'tis yummy faded pink!	The Finch has always been my favourite bag – I carry mine everyday – next in line are Hunter and Rogue equally!

I've been stuffing and hauling my radish Weekender for years!	Claire keeps her Truffle Marlowe by the door. This is a bag that most of my friends and family have – an easy, everyday companion!  Should we make a few in our new Autumnal colours?

What a treat to have a morning like this!	Lavender everywhere!

I also love my Duckfeet Boots!	Piles of things on the floor. I settle in quickly...

Pearl and Honey enjoyed their freedom and new found friendship!

 

Warwick Furnace Farm

Claire and her family moved to Pennsylvania and started a Lavender farm where they make a variety of Lavender Delights, host an Artist’s Retreat, have an inspiring Gallery Space, etc. In addition to their combined love of Lavender, each family member follows their own varied passions in this magical space that they’ve created. Their farm is a short, beautiful drive from us…

Here are a few photographs of Claire’s fantastical and elaborate photographed worlds – her own individual passion.

Skippy Cotton

Emma’s shop is a delight! She combines her drawings, embroidery, and whimsy to form her own House of Curiosities! From ornaments to clothing to artist supplies – have a peek into her wondrous world. She has also navigated her way into the world of AI art and has made some enviable pieces with it (another can of worms we discussed with exuberance)!

Skippy Cotton's year-round ornaments!	Which of course also look splended on a Christmas Tree!

Fragile Earth Exhibit at the Brandywine River Museum

Claire surprised us with a visit!

Courtney Mattison

Porcelain and Stoneware coral reefs whose texture, colour, and allure was so deliciously inspiring that I signed up for a clay class at a cob studio nearby.

Mark Dion Ever a favourite, Søren and I spent an especially long time with his work, chortling and sighing, and all manner of involuntary noise making...So maybe I was a little noisier than Søren.

James ProsekWe investigated James’s mysteries close enough to set off alarms – lucky for us, there weren’t any.

Jennifer AngusAn abundance of bugs and tiny stories built into boxes and wall pieces. Everyone clambered to take in as much detail as possible; no one wanted to leave.

The first abandoned house I remember exploring was across from the grocery store my mom and I skipped to, arm in arm, when I was in 7th grade. We had seen its decaying Victorian turrets peeking above the abundance of neglected foliage many times before braving its withered threshold. Early one Spring, we ventured into that liminal space and I don't believe I ever completely left. Inside reeked of piss and mildew. Broken bottles and yellowed newspapers made a foul floor for weekend teenagers. But in the center – beneath a makeshift skylight and its funnel of wintry, warm, yellow sun – grew a single white tulip. Discovering this unexpected beauty with my mom so long ago, was surely a heavy pour in the cocktail of experiences from my youth that helped determine who I was to become.⁠

Three years ago, just one year after officially beginning our homeschool adventure with Søren and Silas, we decided to move out of Philadelphia in search of a new home amongst the trees. We quickly stumbled upon the patch of land that we’ve come to call The Five Acre Wood – consisting of a ton of invasive growth, some lawn, woods, ponds, animals, two creeks, our house (built in the late 1700s or early 1800s), a spring house (formerly our studio) and – just across the road – a dilapidated barn. Truly, our timing was perfect.

The Old Barn from the road.	We hired Precise Buildings to rebuild the barn!

In the listing Walter had spied a corner of the barn – a cautious partial revealing of this daunting danger for most, we reckoned, and possibly the reason the house had been on the market for so long. But we dreamed of transforming the barn into a studio for art, homeschooling, woodworking, and yoga. Two years after our move, with the sale of our Philadelphia home (previously serving as an Airbnb), we were able to embark on this new adventure.

The project began with the removal of decades – centuries even – of junk that had been accumulating. We briefly considered hauling the stuff to a flea market to help fund the barn restoration, but after moving some of it out (there was so much!) we ordered a dumpster, and set everything curious in rows in the grass for the taking. There were chairs, well-loved ice skates, wooden sleds, tons of old bottles and antique toys – and then came the people – making it a strange theatre. The conversations that arose during the treasure-dispersal resulted in many journal pages of quotidian conversations which reveal people to be anything but the perceived everyday.

Most of these strange treasures found homes...	The telephone operator thing went to a musician who plans to turn it into something musical.

After the emptying, came the digging of an incredibly deep well which resulted in the grinding and unexpected excavating of Wissahickon Schist – also known as trash stone – from which our house was built. I collected a salad container full and transformed some of the pre-ground pigment into paint for my Iris Painter’s Palette.

Look for Bioplastic Pans of this handmade watercolor paint in our First Of a Kind Collection of the Year!	Wissahickon Schist — also known as Trash Stone — makes a gorgeous ghost green colour.

We then removed the lead-free wood siding, the tin roof, the old doors, the flooring, and some beams, with the intention of re-using as much of this as possible in different places both inside of the barn and out. When the township inspector came and saw the rotted state of the exposed bits that were revealed, we had to embark upon a plan b, which brings to mind The Ship of Theseus.

By the time we finished removing the rotted bits, the trusses, the rafters, the floors, it was hard to say if we were reclaiming an old barn or building a new one in its image. The barn shape– the space within the frame – became one of the few parts I could solidly say remained of the historic place. But over the next few weeks – as I observed the delicate skeleton of the old barn standing strong but precarious in the wind and rain, with day now inside and night inside too – I grew suspicious of this boundaryless thing I wanted to keep. What were we preserving, and more, why?

Putting on a new roof before taking it off to remove more of the old.	Delicate skeleton of the old barn.

After getting over the long pause whilst figuring out plan b...	A new view!

Most of the structure is new now, but within it is a tapestry of old materials. Walter transformed the old extinct-ish American Chestnut tree trunk beams into two glorious sets of double doors. An old second floor door, which led to an unsurvivable drop, is now part of the bathroom. The old floorboards were flipped and trimmed and woven with old floorsboards from other barns, and together have been sanded and oiled. The crooked skeleton of hand-hewn wood with its mortise and tenon joints, trunnels, and roman numeral marriage marks, lingers charmingly in the middle of the new open space. The white-washed wall, that once held tobaggons, hockey sticks, and fishing poles still divides the two main spaces. The stone-walled basement, where the barn’s last farm animal – a calf – lived in the 1960s, will soon be a woodshop and ceramic studio. We put windows and skylights throughout the building, replacing the vertical cracks that let only slivers of light in for the past 200 or so years.

The shape within the frame remains, but the air that flowed through it like water through a river, has surely been fully turned over. Already, the newly brightened space has illuminated a life unimagined by the original builders, including family yoga, the beginning of a writing and drawing workshop, the penciling of portraits, the playing of boardgames, the making of maps, a happy Pearl and a sleepy Pearl, and the curiosity of two families embarking on new adventures. The barn is made of pieces that were and are and will be. Are we so different?

A Trunnel – one of many Tree Nails securing the original structure.	Roman Numeral Marriage Marks to help builders determine what went where!

An exterior door that led to the unsurvivable drop, (that looks rather survivable from here...)	...is now our bathroom door!

The Floor Sanders – Søren, Silas, and I — unintentionally recreating The Floor Scrapers by Gustave Caillebotte.	The Floor Scrapers by Gustave Caillebotte

A satisfying before and after! We first rented this Drum Floor Sander and used 60 grit sandpaper, then used this Orbital Sander with 80 and 100 grit.	Finishing the new floor with Citrus Solvent and Tung Oil from The Real Milk Paint Company. We use this natural finish on Peg and Awl treasures too!

Pearl enjoying the new space from her favourite rug – a flea market find!	We painted the floor white! Søren tries out the new staircase that he helped install,

Original wall that divides the two parts of the barn. Pearl and Søren, my loves.	Walter used the saw mill to make doors out of the American Chestnut trunks!

American Chestnut Tree beams born in the 1700s leave their lowly position of being walked upon + now usher in light, people, and animals!	Walter’s gorgeous first go at door building!

This past weekend, the Peg and Awl team traveled back in time with @gilesclement and his partner Kendra, witnessing and partaking in many tintype and ambrotype sessions at the Peg and Awl workshop. The smell of collodion was intoxicating, as Giles expertly poured it onto the plates and gently tilted each one until fully coated, finally tipping one corner into the well-used bottle to collect the excess. The tiny makeshift darkroom housing developer was like a time machine. In the age of digital photography, we snap-snap-snap, hoping 1 in million will be good enough for a quick digital edit and a push to Instagram. For me, seeing Giles set up each portrait with care and shoot at the precise right moment, yanked me back into my olden days, where I had 12 shots per roll of film and a week to wait for the results. Patience, time, care, seem nearly lost to me now, but I suppose our new way is just a different path to the same point. We don’t have to head into a studio, wash behind our ears, and make sure our Sunday best is spotless. We get to snap-snap-snapping in the midst of the action, dirt and all.

Here is to the old and the new, and how lucky we are to be at the crossroads.

Summer’s Studio Moments

How do you spend your long hot summer days?

For me, I’m home, mostly – outside sitting in a folding chair with the cold creek water chilling my feet, sketching and dreaming, or walking along the wildflower-lined roads, stopping to draw and nibble upon the many new plants in my life.

When I’m not outside, it’s another day in the studio, stealing another moment at my desk to write and draw in my journals and sketchbooks. Summer is for gathering ideas and inspiration, and I adore these slow times.

Where will you take your leaving this summer?

Sendak Mini Artist Roll	Beatrix Artist Caddy

Anselm Bookbinding Kits	Foundlings Desk Caddy

Landis Wall Caddy	Handbound Journals

Rainer Maria Rilke

“All things want to fly.
Only we are weighed down by desire,
caught in ourselves
and enthralled with our heaviness.”