Handmade in the United States

Furniture, Architectural Millwork and Home Products since 1978 at American Modern Design Studios our products enhance and educate your life.

My thoughts of designing and manufacturing .

My background of study and career is in Furniture Design, Industrial Design Architectural Millwork, Industrial Pattern making and Manufacturing. Over the past four decades the scope of our projects span from public buildings, educational institutions, hospital public spaces, Industrial products and of course retail and residential. These projects have been featured in major publications locally, nationally and PBS. No matter what the scale of the project or how minor the detail one’s experience forms the vision and becomes the intuitive nature of this work. It lends itself to being in concert with final presentation of the products and always compatible with the needs of the customer. This is the primary mission and paramount to producing small but well executed production runs in furniture, household items, Millwork, educational, garden and boat tooling. All products are crafted in studio, nothing is massed produced. Our products come from renewable resources with repurposed material when possible and made with respect to our environment. Annually in the USA we send twelve million tons of used furniture and home products to landfills plus another one hundred twenty five million tons of construction waste as well. This waste is due to the poor quality of selection and indifference to resources consumed by the marketing of these items. What good can come from this? Longevity married into design is one answer. I have reduced our material waste to a 2% of total resources used when the standard in this industry is above 30%. American Modern Design cares about our earth and all of it’s citizens. Our family hopes you find use for our products in your world.

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FOUR DECADES OF FURNITURE

 
 

Music room. The audio cabinet case is made of 5/4 Cherry. Outlined in Walnut inlay with corners of Abalone shell.

Art Deco cabinets on the left & right of fireplace, ebonized Mahogany trims the quilted Maple case.

Modern era entrance table in quilted Maple with Padauk ebonized Mahogany accents.

 

ART DECO MAHOGANY CABINET

 
 

SALON STYLE DECO CABINET FOR BATH

DRAWER COMPARTMENTS TRIMED IN COCO BOLO

MAHOGANY CASE NESTED ON A EBONIZED TRESTLE

STEPPED PANELED FRONT

FULL ACCESS

QUILTED MAPLE

MAHOGANY AND PANGA ACCENTS

FULL ACCESS

ELEVATED ABOVE THE FLOOR

WALL HUNG A SPACE SAVER

SIMPLE INLAY

EBONY ACCENTS ON QUILTED MAPLE

WE FINISH ALL SURFACES WITH INTEREST

COCO BOLO ACCENTS

ASSEMBLY

 

GIVING PURPOSE TO A FOOTPRINT

 
 

This was a under used space because of the scale and location off of a bath and near a bedroom more of a passage. The slope of the roof line crowded the footprint. One book case started an identity of a reading nook or a nursery .

Centered under a skylight in clear Lacquer satin finish book matched back wall. Appointed in accents of Mahogany from paneling repurposed for second life.

Tight to the wall with legs to flared out to tip toed feet, dots and grooves of Mahogany inlay arranged to catch ones interest.

 

GIVING LIFE TO A ROOM’S BACKGROUND

 
 

Painted or stained wainscoting captures a room. Creating a intimate setting for a dining room or a library. It helps in elongating a hallway warming a home.

 

Our millwork is made to the scale of the room. Fitted to the site measurements keeping mechanicals in mind and in concert to the finished look.

 

Raised panel depths developing light and shadow.

New Mahogany door in same style of 1877 original

Beauty & Security

GERMAN ART GLASS

Repurposed door with new millwork

New art glass panel

Bright and welcoming

Eye catching detail

Entrances to remember

GARDEN PLANTER NEXT TO THE KITCHEN DOOR

PRIVACY WITH AIR FLOW

Privacy

Cedar in Linseed oil

Built for years of use

Designed with care

Simple traditional influence

Hand made one at a time

Cheerful blonde fir

Designed to fit the scale

Panga plugs dot each treads center

 

OUR INTERIOR MILLWORK MAKES A HOME

 
 

This home built in 1936 in the Story Book style. Being built during the depression the original stairs were in the rear of the home as the access point to the attic. 2015 we installed a central staircase from the basement to the second floor.

 

The Balustrade and Newel post are anchored to the framing in a confirming balance of structure and beauty. Beneath the Newel cap is storage to keep the drawings of the project.

 

This staircase now runs from the first floor to the finished second floor.

 

OUR EXTERIOR MILLWORK IN PROPER SCALE AND PERIOD DETAILS PRESERVE CHARACTER

 
 

The panels and gate are in 5/4 Cedar, mostly clear with structural framing hidden from view. This is transitional 1880 Victorian in one of the Historic Districts of Oak Park, IL. Victorian Architecture is feminine in form thus the full encompassed porch surround to complete the existing form.

A Roscoe Village Victorian home brought back. It lost it’s details with age and budgeting decisions. Bland for decades then reborn in Queen Ann a century later.

This home was five additions grouped around the original timber frame structure. The home was brought to life in 2016 in a late Victorian transitional theme.

 

SAVING OUR PAST

 
 

Failure is eminent but then it always is. We live with the elements of nature and gravity, things decay.

A new base in MDO plywood, aluminum feet and Sapele wood for another century of use.

Back safe and secure in scale with period. All five columns needed this. If the repair is unnoticeable then it’s successful.

 

Complementing what is already there.

 

DIAMOND CUTOUTS OF SUN LIGHT MOVE WITH THE SUN’S PATH.

Gardens in all sizes

GARDEN ENTRANCE FITTED BELOW THE BOW OF A TREE A

OUR ENTRANCE SCREENING COMES PAINTED MADE FROM CYPRESS OR CEDAR

A LONE PINE TREE BECOMES A GIANT BONSAI IN A PRIVATE GARDEN

 

Traditional Shop Skills

I was lucky to have entered my career when apprenticeships & schools with Industrial Design Programs were common. Their influences still remain in my work as it developed to blend with the current Tech norms more common in manufacturing today. When I started out in Chicago I was befriended by Edgar Miller and Victor Skrebneski and told by both to live in the atmosphere of the craft. My encounters with Gyo Obata from boyhood to adult guided my thoughts to embrace the mistakes as new directives of success. I now share these same thoughts with all that venture into design. I suggest to all who have an interest in 20th century design to research Wright and Miller, Saarinen, Mies Van der Rohe, Johnson, Frey, Maloof, Nakashima, Eileen Gray, Lilly Reich, Kahn, Eames, Castle, all the giants of design and vision.

Our garden box complete with tools.

Our garden box complete with tools.

Our own Designs of Home Products

This is our basic Garden Box, a sturdy frame and feel. We filled it with the tools most us need at hand while performing garden tasks. It has a great selection of well made tools from the early Spring layout & prep to pruning, weeding, upkeep and final harvest.

Laminating fixtures

Laminating fixtures

Dedicated jigs, forms in pattern making traditions

Dedicated jigs, forms in pattern making traditions

Form & Function

This is a photo of our basic Garden Box in the manufacturing process. Each component is made from the bending forms to the fixtures that hold it together during assembly. All hand made in our family studio in the U.S.A.