People generally agree about what "artisan" means... 

An artisan is a skilled worker who crafts items that may be functional or strictly decorative, including furniture, clothing, jewelry, household items, and tools.  What sets artisans apart is that they actually work with their own hands,  their own tools, and lend their own special mix of creativity and common sense to producing exceptionally fine results for their customers. 

...but an "artisanat" is a unique form of business organization that offers you special quality and value.

An artisanat is a formal group of individual craftsman who have come together under a business umbrella to offer customers a broad range of highly skilled craftsman services and the fine finished work product that comes only from handcrafted solutions. 

People familiar with the French language and the history of handcraftsmanship in Europe are likely to see the word "artisanat" as meaning a group or guild of craftspeople, and to assume that the word "artisanat" is ancient, perhaps dating from the renaissance period of European history, before the Industrial Revolution.

It may come as a surprise, then, to learn that the word "artisanat" was invented in the 20th century, only after World War I, and only as a result of an intense national debate over how to tax artisans working in their own homes or workshops. 

At the end of World War I, France's master craftsmen had no national organization, no representation in the government, and no identification in national census reports.  This said, they were taxed monthly, and at a very high rate.

It was not until October, 1920, in an article in the Alsatian weekly, the Gazette des Metiers, that Julien Fontènge introduced the word "artisanat" into the vocabulary of French politics, as an indicator of the political awakening of an artisan social class in France determined to reduce its tax burden.

By 1925, all had changed.  Several hundred thousand master tradesmen belonged to a national confederation of artisans, had received formal representation at the seats of local, regional, and national government, and had won long sought after preferential tax treatment that had eluded artisans for so long.

These purely political events literally marked, in effect, a kind of official recognition of artisans' collective and creative reality - a self-conscious and politically active artisanal movement that evolved into much more: a way for skilled craftsman to be recognized for their know-how and commitment to excellence.

Today, "artisanat" has rightfully come to mean any organized group of artisans, in one or more trades, who take special pride, and who have opened their commercial activity to outside scrutiny as craftspeople committed to building their reputation for delivering excellent workmanship.

CLBrody Artisanat brings this tradition to the Greater Washington DC metropolitan area by identifying and presenting people of exceptional skill who take pride in the production of special goods and services to preserve, restore, and enhance customers' antiques and vintage items.

For more detail on the fascinating history of the artisanat movement, see “The Politics of Survival – Artisans in 20th Century France” by Steven M. Zdatny, from which much of this information has been drawn.

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