Featured artwork: The painting accompanying this story, Huffman Farm by Audrey Gross Sherrill, is available for purchase. Click the title to see the artwork in our artist directory.

I’ve been working on the next issue of Foothills Digest, and the theme is home. It’s a subject that reaches far beyond the walls of a house.

Here in western North Carolina, home is often tied to the land around us. It might be the view you’ve known since childhood, a front step worn smooth by generations of feet, or a room where the things you love have slowly found their places. For someone else, home may be a new beginning in a place that still feels unfamiliar.

For this issue, I’m exploring the many ways a place becomes ours. There will be beautiful spaces and regional craftsmanship, along with the people whose work gives our homes their character. I’m interested in the things families pass down, the memories that settle into familiar rooms, and what happens to that sense of belonging as life changes.

The mountains have always influenced the way people live here. You can see that connection in the materials used to build a house, in the objects people make by hand, and in the choices that make one home feel different from any other. That regional sense of place will run through the entire issue.

I’m keeping the specific features under wraps a little longer, but I’m excited about the stories taking shape and the photographs that will bring them to life. I hope readers will recognize a little of their own experience in these pages, whether their families have lived in the foothills for generations or they’re just beginning to put down roots.