They attribute the recent growing interest for private label projects, including those from competitors, where furniture companies contact them about having Hellman-Chang manufacture their products, to this.įountain side table. Hellman-Chang became part of the handmade Brooklyn scene, before it was a thing, at a time when consumers started looking for artisanal products tagged “Made in America”. Founded in 2008, in a time of recession, the founders chose to focus on highlighting how the best-made and well-designed furniture could come from America it doesn’t have to come from Europe, as Chang said during the interview. High-end means pricey with an appropriate splash of “it girl” style, yet the heart of the company is as honorable as its founders are involved. Later, their products were used for the set of the series Gossip Girl in one of the episodes, the company logo can be seen on one of the moving crates when the character Chase moves into a new office and another character asks: Is that a Hellman-Chang dining table? The success of this project led to their exhibiting in trade shows and to one of their tables being selected for Carrie’s bedroom in Sex in the City. In the realm of high-end, it’s often about who meets who. Courtesy of Hellman-Chang.Īlthough they disguised a shared workstation as a busy company base, they quit their day job and founded their company after the visit from the Four Seasons which turned into a contract for 15 pieces. “We sprinkled sawdust around the workshop space to make it look like we were busy making a lot of furniture,” Eric Chang said in a phone interview with ArchiExpo e-Magazine. Still, they needed these designers to believe they could produce a semi-large quantity of furniture in an acceptable time frame. The two friends welcomed the Four Seasons interior designers and representatives to their co-op workshop-without having founded a company, without having employees or a full-time workload. In 2006, with no connection to the design world outside their acquired skills, they entered their Z Pedestal table in a competition and received Interior Design magazine’s Best of Year award, along with attention from professionals such as the designers of the Four Seasons hotels who called a week later. Self-identified as nerdy while in middle school, the two friends learned ‘old school’ techniques that would become the foundation of their talent to craft sought-after furniture. While occupied with full-time jobs, the duo rented a space in Brooklyn in the early 2000s where they satisfied their need to create by producing solid wood furniture pieces on the weekends as a hobby. Their sixth-grade selves ventured into a world of craftsmanship through a shared interest in workshop classes and woodworking, a passion that would follow them well after graduating from university with varying degrees. The tag phrase “fake it ‘til you make it” doesn’t exactly equate to how childhood friends Dan Hellman and Eric Chang founded high-end furniture brand Hellman-Chang-not exactly. Shortly into a new chapter of the high-end furniture brand, Hellman-Chang adds new furniture pieces to its collections while preparing its first-ever lighting line.
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