A Message from Jim Mischel
June 3, 2015
Anyone who knows me knows how much I appreciate innovation. Coming up with new ideas and working with a team to bring the concepts into the marketplace is thrilling for me. Seeing the good work of others can be an inspiration and a creativity boost as well. When I travel for business I’m always looking for exciting products. Our Mirrors are in hospitality establishments around the world, so I get to see some pretty amazing things.
Imagine my excitement when I come across a company that, like Electric Mirror, is creating incredible interior products, right in my backyard of the Pacific Northwest. Urban Hardwoods, a Seattle-based company, uses locally salvaged wood to handcraft stunning and high-quality furniture. They work with homeowners and tree service companies to remove unhealthy, dying or otherwise troublesome trees and give them a “second life” as one-of-a-kind, modern furniture for residential and commercial clients.
Like Electric Mirror, Urban Hardwoods is creating American jobs as a local manufacturer. The company mills the salvaged trees in South Seattle (about 90 percent of which come from within a 20 mile radius of Seattle). Then the trees are cured for up to three years and then— here’s something fun — Urban Hardwoods’ artisans craft the wood into furniture that celebrates the tree’s best qualities.
While most lumber yards won’t take trees with limbs falling off or with nails or bolts in them, this company’s designers will use those supposed flaws to make the furniture all the more special and beautiful. Everyone who works in manufacturing for Urban Hardwoods has some kind of art background, with degrees in sculpture, fine arts, architecture and the like.
General Manager Bryan Reed says one of the best parts of working for Urban Hardwoods is watching the salvaged trees get transformed. “On the outside the trees are rough and rugged, not particularly beautiful, but it’s like a geode, when you slice into it it’s beautiful. So often it’s a surprise.”
Urban Hardwoods has showrooms in Seattle, San Francisco and Santa Monica. The company is growing quickly and has an expansive inventory that they can deliver to residential and commercial clients for dinner tables, benches, conference tables, and reception desks.
Check out Urban Hardwoods for yourself to see what I’m talking about.