Our Story

I turned that into a living and ran my own remodeling business for seven years. I loved that no two days were ever the same. Later I worked in sales, where I learned how to listen for what a customer actually wants and guide them to it. That turns out to be exactly what custom furniture takes.

Two things knocked me off that path. My construction tools were stolen and I was absolutely crushed. Then a shoulder injury took me out of contracting for good. For a long time, I just resigned myself to office work. Eventually, I stopped trying to fit a round dowel into a flat biscuit hole and admitted to myself what I'd known all along — at heart, I am a maker.

I turned the injury into opportunity and JM Mountain Studio was born. Right now, it runs out of a tiny 200-square-foot basement in a mountain cabin. I work with the space — every machine is on wheels, secondhand tools I've slowly collected — and it works, but it fights me. It's definitely taught me lessons in patience.

I've spent a lifetime building things people keep and know how to make the best of any situation. This isn't a hobby dressed up as a business — it's the work I was meant to do, and I'm finally in a place to do it right.

It's work, but it's not work — it's fun work. I'm doing my job, but I call it going down to play.

— JJ