BRIGHT-MINDED HOME- April 2012
By Melissa Coleman

Q+A with David Moser, principal designer at Thos. Moser Cabinetmakers

David, youngest son of Thomas Moser, is the principal designer at the iconic 40-year-old Auburn furniture company with showrooms
in Freeport and across the country.

Q: Describe your vision of sustainable furniture design.
A: We design our furniture to last as long as, if not longer than, it took the tree that made it to grow, and to be passed down through a family. I don’t design for fashion or timeliness, which ebbs and flows, but for timelessness—to create something that will survive my life and be just as current then as now. This seems to me the most basic form of sustainability. Products today often exhibit design obsolescence—they are made to break down within five years. Then you must buy another and another so in the end you consume and pay more than if you bought one table designed to last a lifetime.

Q: Is furniture art?
A: I don’t know that furniture ever really becomes art, but the process is artful. Art, for me, has no masters—it doesn’t owe anything to anybody. Design has a lot of different masters: economy, craft, utility. Still, looking at good design is like hearing music that satisfies the soul; you come into its harmony and are free for a moment.

Q: What’s next?
A: The long-term plan is to build a showroom on the plot of land in downtown Freeport [currently featuring a Moser chair in a glass case]. I like to dream about what I would create for that space if I were an architect—glass and stone, natural materials, gardens, art. A place you go not only for the furniture, but just to visit. A reason to pull off the highway.