After Bahram Sadighian (an inventor) and his wife, Shadi (a designer), built their Alexandria, Virginia, home in 2004, they had a lot of lumber left over, so they started making furniture from it. "Neighbors would ask us where we got our coffee table," Shadi remembers. And so MODERN RUST was born. Their sturdy dining sets are still made of construction cast-offs and start at $220 for the smallest size. modernrustfurniture.com