Peter Buchanan-Smith was a successful graphic designer when, in 2009, he had his biggest hit with a handmade axe that sported a colourful lacquered barrel. Soon it was sought after by Hollywood names such as David Lynch and exhibited at London's Saatchi Gallery. Having grown up on a farm in Ontario, Buchanan-Smith had spent much time in the wilderness of northern Canada and knew the necessity of a good axe out there. For the urban vanguard that soon flocked to his New York shop, the handmade and limited axes were primarily a symbol of the return to nature, of adventure, and of the simple work of their great-grandfathers' generation. For Father's Day 2010, Best Made Company sold more than 100 axes, at around 180 U.S. dollars apiece.

From web designs to campfires

Today you can buy a complete range of retro camping equipment at Best Made: pocket knives from France and Japan, German saws and English scissors, enamelled plates and coffee mugs, gnarled backpacks, blankets, compasses, first aid kits, 1970s U.S. Army survival guides and even a complete set of nautical flags. And so it attracts the young advertisers and web designers who want to take a break from their MacBooks for a week or so, and escape from the forests of New York to forests of an entirely different kind.