Sunday, September 4, 2016

Have it your way - Furniture shopping in Sarchi Costa Rica

It's interesting how your view of things can change so quickly when you move to a new country.

I have been amazed at the beauty of so many things that I never paid much attention to before or never thought would be "my taste"

One of those things is furniture.

I am a lover of fine furniture but mostly modern, contemporary furniture.

When I got to Costa Rica I noticed that the houses were furnished mostly with very heavy furniture made from local hardwoods. Our house is filled with all handcrafted custom furniture. After being here for a while I began to notice the quality of the furniture and the fine detail and intricacy of the work.

We just happen to live about 20 minutes from the town of Sarchi. It’s been the center of the woodworking crafts and furniture making in Costa Rica for the past 100 years. There are about 70 family-owned workshops, or “talleres,” with their showrooms dotting the main road winding up the hill toward the center of town. No frills, just their best pieces on display. They include intricately-carved traditional styles to ultra-modern clean lines. Only plantation-grown or sustainable tropical hardwoods are used, like cenizaro, guanacaste, melina, and cedar.


here are 2 other traditional Costa Rican rocking chairs that we have on our patio

I've been in the market to buy a couple of rocking chairs for myself. The Costa Rica rocking chairs I want are manufactured in Caobilla wood (from the mahogany family) and real leather! They come in a variety of colors. You can pretty much order furniture any way you want it here. All custom made. They are good sized rockers and can be used for the porch or living room, and they can fold up to be quite compact! You can also choose an engraved chair for no extra cost - (the rocker is etched and stamped with Costa Rica on the bottom leather to signify it's authenticity).

Our landlord Marcelo, volunteered to take me to Sarchi (the guys came along) to pick out a couple of the chairs (BTW - we have the "best" landlord!!!) I have seen the rockers online and they can get kind of pricey so was happy to have him along to make sure that I was not "gringoed" (charged a higher price because I am not from Costa Rica).


On the way we stopped by his father's house to check out the beautiful roses. Marcelo grows 80 different varieties of roses as well and has a beautiful greenhouse down in the coffee grove behind our house.

Then on we went to Sarchi.

Below is a short video and a look at our final selection (BTW - we got a VERY good price for the 2 chairs)

THANKS Marcelo!!!

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