Growing up in Midwest Ohio, I was surrounded by antique furniture and older homes. The year I was born my parents purchased my great-great-great grandparents farm house built in the 1880s. The original wood floors, wooden barn, two chicken coops, brick cellar and a tiny outhouse are still on the property. We weren’t farmers, but the property felt like a small farm growing up. We had chickens, turkeys, goats, dogs and a lot of barn cats. In the summer we canned corn, green beans and tomatoes from my mom’s garden. My great grandmother taught me how to sew, knit and crochet. I still have her Singer Featherweight I use to this day. I’ve always been an active, hands on person, helping with the many things that happened in an old house with a family of 6 (and 30 animals).

I grew up surrounded by furniture from the late 1800s; bedroom dressers with dovetailed drawers, mortise and tenon cupboards, and staked benches, many of which were purchased at auctions or the antique store. As a child I thought this was just old furniture - thinking, why did we not have new things? I didn’t realize at the time how well the furniture was made and took for granted the simple beauty and longevity of it all. It was not until I moved to Seattle, WA, out of college and needed to buy my first dresser that I realized what a dovetail drawer was and that this was very hard to find in a furniture store.

I wanted a solid wood dresser, so I did the obvious thing and called my mom for advice. She told me to check if there are dovetails before buying - that would be an indicator of how well built it is. I saved my earnings from my first job out of school, with the goal to buy a dresser once and have it for the rest of my life. It took me months of searching before I found an antique dresser I adored and could afford. Five years later I am still absolutely in love with it. Visually, the dresser is fairly simple in design. There are no carvings, curves, inlay, or decoration to it. The joinery has kept the dresser in service for well over 100 years. It’s functional, well built, and has a timeless look; this is what I love about it. Finding this old dresser with hand cut dovetails kickstarted my journey into furniture making. I wanted to know more about how it was made and if I could make furniture like this for my home using hand tools like this dresser was made from.

Five years later my home is filling up with furniture I built in my shop in Sammamish, Wa. Taking the time to create furniture that not only serves a purpose, but also charmingly blends in and complements a space is exciting to me. I hope to play a part in furnishing other people’s homes with beautiful, well made furniture that they will cherish and pass down to their loved ones.