Once, to have said that an article is 'made by hand' would have been a statement of the obvious. In today's world, however, 'handmade' is a mark of distinction. It connotes a kind of authenticity and devotion that people, increasingly cast as passive consumers rather than active citizens, feel is otherwise missing from their lives. With citizenship comes moral responsibility, yet how can we be responsible for a world that comes to us readymade? At the very same moment when the world is at our fingertips, it also seems completely out of our hands.
-Tim Ingold
