Craft Consumer

Craft consumer refers to a person who obtains objects made by skilled artisans. Until the nineteenth century, crafts were ordinarily made for practical or ceremonial use by part-time or full-time specialists. Although some crafts were traded or sold in markets, most were either exchanged through kin networks or appropriated by the state. In the past two centuries, crafts have increasingly been made explicitly for sale. Many commercial crafts are more or less identical to those produced for use in daily life. Most, however, have been altered substantially to attract potential buyers. Some “tourist crafts” created solely for market purposes may be only tangentially related to local cultural traditions. Nonetheless, the search for “authenticity” that motivates many purchases of crafts is an important aspect of consumer ...