PROFILE-JAN/FEB 2009

by Joshua Bodwell Photography Irvin Serrano

A designer’s life of curiosity explores connections and possibilities

I’m thinking of switching from coffee to tea,” says Carol Bass, with a slight southern accent, as she settles into a wicker chair in the corner of her radiantly red living room. She then grows quiet for a moment, as though uttering this aloud has led Bass to seriously consider it for the first time.

But Carol Bass bristles with so much creative energy that modifying her caffeine intake hardly seems of consequence.

Since cofounding Maine Cottage Furniture in the late 1980s, Bass has become known as something of a color visionary; she seems to discover her palettes in nature and then electrify them.

On this morning, just days before the presidential election, Bass is excited and hopeful. The 60-year-old glances at a piece of graph paper, taped to a nearby window, that shows a possible furniture arrangement for a cottage she is designing. The red room  around her is bright, fresh, and, above all, comfortable—rarely does a home seem to physically mirror the character of its owner to such a striking degree.

Situated on Littlejohn Island off the coast of Yarmouth, Bass’s three-bedroom cottage appears somber from the outside; low slung and green shingled, it is tucked against a rocky outcropping on a wooded lot with no water views. Inside, however, the house explodes with personality.

There are dazzling colors and patterns everywhere: rich yellows, reds, purples, greens, and oranges abound. Shelves overflow with bright flea-market pottery from the 1930s and 1940s. The vibrant walls are teaming with the work of Maine artists such as Philip Barter, Mary Bourke, Tom Hall, and Tom Higgins; Matt Barter’s warm portrait of Marsden Hartley seems part homage, part sly wink. Bass’s own paintings are also on display, as are her wall sculptures—which feature whimsical fish and people—made from wood collected along the road or from local landfills.

In short, Bass’s home boldly announces the presence of an artistic soul.

A conversation with Bass is just as captivating as the art exhibited around her house: it can bend off in dozens of interesting directions, like the crooked limbs of the old oaks of her South Carolina childhood. You know when something has piqued Bass’s interest because her eyes narrow in a sign of excited thought. She may leap from describing her recent trip to the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, to raving about the public art that Maine stone sculptor Jesse Salisbury has been creating as part of his Schoodic International Sculpture Symposium. Then she’ll pause and throw out a philosophical observation, such as, “Our souls are here to love and create,” before tying the seemingly disparate thoughts neatly together.

Bass arrived in Maine in 1970 while on a road trip with three girlfriends. Fresh from majoring in painting and drawing at the University of Georgia, Bass thought she would explore the state for a few weeks. “But none of us went home,” she says with a laugh. “Then I started getting into the real Maine, and I remember feeling this is a place that is open to change.”

Bass soon met and married Peter Bass. In the late 1980s, after Peter had worked for the Bass Shoe Company, which was founded by his family, and the boat manufacturer Hinckley, the couple decided to start their own business.

Bass, who had long been collecting work by Maine painters, had a realization so simple it was revolutionary: people bought art to complement their sofas, rugs, or drapes, so why not create a line of furniture specifically designed to complement art? In other words, begin with the art. “There was no furniture that didn’t conflict with my art,” Bass says with a smile and casual shrug.

Maine Cottage Furniture was born in Yarmouth in 1988, mixing Shaker- and Mission-style simplicity with a heavy dose of contemporary color. “It was just the right time for it,” says Bass. “It’s how people want to live today: they want to live in an environment they can be the most creative in.” The furniture was not only embraced nationwide but served as a touchstone for the burgeoning “cottage” industry, spawning knock-offs and catapulting a new vision of Maine design. In addition to appearing in hundreds of stores around the country, Maine Cottage Furniture now has company stores in Maine, Florida, and South Carolina.

Since the late 1990s, when the couple separated, Bass has stepped back from her role at the company and now acts mostly as a consultant. She remains active in interior design and has written three books on the subject: The Cottage Book: Living Simple and Easy, Maine Living, and Color Your Home. And, as she always has, Bass continues to create art. Her paintings appear to contain more color than the canvas can bear—the ever-present symbols of fish, birds, earth, and nature seem poised to break free of their two-dimensional prisons and crawl up the walls. Bass’s paintings are celebrations of life and of the countless threads that bind us to the natural world.

“You know what I’m really interested in these days?” asks Bass, her eyes narrowing in that familiar way. “Culture as industry. I think that’s my next focus.” She explains how inspiring it was to attend a recent symposium at the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts on Deer Isle called Creating in Maine: Makers, Manufacturers, and Materials, which brought together Maine-based business owners with designers and artisans. Bass goes on to explain that artists capable of treating their work as a business are more likely to succeed. Then the phone rings, cutting off Bass mid-thought.

Meals on Wheels, where she regularly volunteers, is on the line and would like her to cover a delivery shift. Bass apologizes, she has to run, but not before she finishes her thought. “Dirigo means ‘I lead,’” says Bass, referring to state motto of Maine. “So I say, ‘Let’s get going!’ Let’s show people what’s possible!”

“That’s my reason for living,” Bass muses before rushing off. “My reason for living is to get people to look at things in other ways…to get others to be curious.”