Logs typically conjure images of remote cabins and plaid-clad workers felling trees. As these seven creative designers and craftspeople show, though, log furniture can be cool, clever and contemporary, too.

Rather than presupposing a finished shape, Mth Woodworking uses logs individually to inspire and guide each unique piece they create.

Their addition of a resin surface largely leaves the natural shape of the stump or trunk alone, and highlights the cross-section showing through the top. Until the resin dries around the log, the end result always remains something of a mystery.

With a combination of roughness and care, Kaspar Hamacher chops logs into sections, strips the bark away and places smaller burning logs on top to create legs from the charred remains.

Given the natural ingredients of both raw timber and burning embers, the results, while clearly of a kind when set next to each other, are nonetheless always unique.

Hilla Shamia casts logs into liquid aluminum, burning the edges and creating a dark interstitial zone between the dull gray metal and bright near-white interior of each log.

Since the logs are cast on the surface side, they provide a warmer texture to those sitting (benches or chairs) or leaning (tables) on them, while providing sturdy and predictable support below.