ALEXANDER KRUTSKY

1950 - 2020

KRUTSKY, Alexander Woodworker, Mentor, Friend Alexander "Alex" Krutsky passed away peacefully, just as he lived, on October 9, in the home he shared with his wife, Maggie McNally. He died from complications related to Lewy Body Dementia. Alex, a longtime resident of Cambridge, Massachusetts was a fine woodworker, furniture maker, and a 1981 graduate of the renowned cabinet and furniture making program at Boston's North Bennet Street School, where he was a part-time instructor from 1985 until his retirement in 2017. As a member of Fort Point Cabinetmakers, a cooperative woodworking shop, Alex maintained a successful custom commission business serving an eclectic mix of private, commercial, and nonprofit clients who sought his unique skills and approach to working with wood. Alex spent his early years in Tanguy Homesteads, an interracial cooperative community his mother, Harriet, and father, Edward, helped establish in Southeastern Pennsylvania in the early 1940s. Born in 1950, he was the youngest of three boys. He followed his big brothers, Edward, II "Ned" and Jonathan "Jon" to Westtown Friends' School, a local Quaker school. After Westtown he bounced around a bit before coming to Boston to pursue his interest in woodworking. As he learned more about traditional forms of furniture and technique, Alex began to more deeply explore the work that came from his home area outside of Philadelphia, from 18th and 19th century spice boxes to the 20th century work of Wharton Esherick and George Nakashima. Inspired, he found ways to incorporate the ideas, forms, and techniques to create new work that expressed his own creative style. Alex was meticulously respectful of the materials and tools of the trade, and as an instructor he was deliberate and precise in language, working intentionally and patiently with students to help cultivate practical skill and professional attitude. Marking his retirement from North Bennet, he was appreciated for being "generous with his time and knowledge, and humble about his abilities," and noted for his "gentle guidance and quick wit." In coming together with Maggie McNally in 1989, Alex found the spark to his personal and creative life that would bring deep joy and a continuous expansion of view. They married in 1990, bringing worlds together in a consummate Cantabrigian Quaker/Unitarian convergence. Together Alex and Maggie pursued mutual passions and adventures—music, food, travel, cycling, and baseball, among them—and, as they did so, surrounded themselves with a huge extended family of friends and relatives, often entertaining in their Cambridgeport home. His voice was quiet but his wisdom ran deep, and he had a way of summing up a situation, often with a chuckle, that made people lean in to hear him. He is survived by his wife Maggie, brothers Ned and Jon, and their wives Tina and Susan, nieces Anna, Rebecca, and Carson, nephews-in-law Rowan and Rodrigo, brother-in-law Dennis, sister-in-law Susana, niece Season and her family, Jon, Julian, and Elias. He loved his woodworking community. Donations in his memory may be made to North Bennet Street School or to a cause of your choosing that speaks to you. A private service will be held.

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