By Anish Majumdar photography by markel redondo
LABOR OF LOVE
The Fabric of Life
In an industry run by machines, master weaver SAM KASTEN stays true to his art, handcrafting pieces that speak from the soul.
D 30 JANUARY 15, 2012 AA.COM/AMERICANWAY
eep in the Berk- shires, in a Mas- sachusetts town called Pittsfield,
lies a red-brick schoolhouse. Inside, sunlight streams in through 6-foot-tall windows, illuminating worn maple fl oors and classrooms with slate chalk- boards. Formerly a parochial school, today it remains a place of learning. Only the lessons here come not from grim-faced nuns wielding rulers but from wooden handlooms arranged in place of desks. Now a work- shop for master handweaver Sam Kasten, the schoolhouse is a temple of silence and strain, home to days of Kasten hunched
