In Eldred, across from Peck’s, next to the post office and behind the library, you’ll find Sullivan Public. A garage-turned-art-studio, retail space, and community classroom, the 3,400 square foot building has been reborn with the love and care of artist Jessie Lazar.

On a sunny afternoon, writer Jillian Scheinfeld notices how Eleanor Friedberger is slowly settling into her life upstate. In her four-acre property, every corner reflects a negotiation between past and present. Objects and memories intermingle with a life recently uprooted from the city. Friedberger calls herself a collector, but the word understates what happens here. Her home in Ulster County, New York, is part residence, part studio, part archive of personal history, where sound and silence — and domestic routines — coexist. For Friedberger, her possessions are inseparable from the life she is building, from the songs she writes, and from the adjustments of learning to live among the forests and fields of the Catskills.

Arriving at Marine Penvern’s “humble little abode,” her eponymous clothing atelier on Hudson’s Warren Street, is like being welcomed into a jewel box. Handmade garments beckon: boiled wool jackets with red zippers running down one side, her signature; playful capes and silk chiffon skirts in shiny metallic; “protective gear” made of aluminum-coated wool sheathed in polyurethane, a sardonic take on 5G conspiracy theories; and a striking floral house dress in soft, fine wool, her version of pandemic loungewear.

I am sitting at a table inside the private quarters of bed and breakfast, The Milliner, located in Hudson, NY, owned by artist Charlotta Janssen and her partner, photographer Shannon Greer. Their carefully crafted space is a world populated by artists, activists, visiting neighbors, old paint trays, and good food. The late morning light is coming through the guest room window, which catches Janssen’s crisp blue eyes as she sits on a stool. The fine lines around her face tell a story of a life well-lived. 

Alexandra Climent’s story has many layers, much like the extraordinary material she uses to make her art. As the self taught woodworker walks me through it from the sun-soaked living room of the new home she shares with her partner and pup in Narrowsburg, I catch myself interrupting to gasp out awestruck questions like, “how did you not give up?” which I asked not once but twice during our conversation. Her answer is accompanied by a hearty laugh and an easygoing humility that comes naturally: “I still ask myself that! I asked myself that yesterday.” 

Christi Johnson exemplifies the coexistence of creativity and sustainability. From repurposing discarded treasures to nurturing a lush garden, the designer’s life upstate is a masterclass in the art of unhurried living, where each decision is sewn with intention and purpose. 

Life moves in seasons, and that measure shifts our sense of cause and consequence. Emily Johnston works within is long view. She lifts pigment from stone born eons ago and grinds it with river water. She calls the practice integrity of intuition; through it, art binds to land and to time. Color on the canvas becomes a record of fossil and tide, joining medium with maker, place with era.