Long before Matt Sears established Haskel Sears Design in 2005, he was working to open up his own woodworking shop where he could do things his way. Sears’ way uses reclaimed and domestic wood products to create “contemporary heirloom” pieces for commercial and residential clients.
When Sears was 19 years old, his first woodworking job was in Athens, Ga., where he began sanding and finishing and slowly working his way up into restoration and repairs of antiques. After three years of doing this, he and his wife Amanda both applied to schools in Portland, Ore.: she to law school and him to art school. They made the move there and soon found that things, including tuition, were very expensive. Amanda went to law school and Matt got an apprenticeship with John Lake, who trained in England, to restore high-end investment antiques.
With four years of production machinery and shop experience, Sears was able to get a job supervising Lake’s woodshop, making antique reproductions and restoring investment antiques. It was here that Sears says he learned all his design and creative experience.
After five years of building antiques and new furniture, the Sears wanted to move back to the South. They spent six months looking and decided on Chattanooga. “We really liked the similarities to Portland that Chattanooga had. There was a river downtown, a huge environmental movement just getting started six years ago, all these LEED projects that were starting, and I wanted to open a woodshop that was environmentally sound and also respected my employees as far as the chemicals we used and the environment they worked in.”
The Sears settled into Chattanooga, founding Haskel Sears Design in 2005, opening Matt’s studio on Rossville Avenue in 2009, and Amanda becoming the managing attorney at a firm called Clark and Washington. Sears says the great part about his line of work is that every day presents something new. “Every day I’m meeting with a new client and designing a new piece or thinking about a new interior. With commercial work, I like the process of taking an empty shell and filling it, creating an environment that people will interact with. It’s not like a piece of art that hangs on the wall that people see but don’t interact with. People use and manipulate my pieces every single day.”
In making his pieces, the process is environmentally minded, using domestic plywood and hardwoods in addition to reclaimed wood. They use only water based finishes and glues, avoiding formaldehyde off-gassing. “My mission is to build sustainable and enduring pieces that change consumers to stewards,” Sears says. He works to build something that creates a legacy with each client, that outlasts him and can be passed down to create new heirlooms in the private and residential side. In the commercial work, he is given spaces that have to function in a highly efficient way and have to last a long time.
“That’s always a battle to make things affordable, but at the same time, deliver quality that is going to last and be functional,” Sears says. “You can spend $10 on a sheet of plywood or $50 on a sheet of plywood but the difference is going to be huge in terms of how long it’s going to last and what it’s going to look like just a couple of months down the road.” Buildings all across Chattanooga provide a treasure trove of materials in reclaimed wood and red brick. The materials from these buildings comes from old growth trees that have a quality far superior than what can be bought in stores today, Sears says.
Greenlife Grocery is one such building that was rebuilt out of the bricks and boards of the Knitting Mill, and is a place where Sears’ work is displayed throughout. Sears’ work is peppered everywhere in the city, and many may not realize he’s built something when they encounter it because it really is a part of the environment, Sears says. These locations include Northshore Yoga, The Social, and soon the cabinetry, bar, tables and more within the new Mellow Mushroom location on Shallowford Road.
Sears says it costs more to deconstruct a building as opposed to just demolishing it, and so he has to educate the client on the value of those materials. Examples of his work within The Crash Pad show just how far reclaimed materials can be taken into modern design, with bunk beds that look more like high-rise buildings in design than sleeping quarters. Sears’ work at the new Mellow Mushroom is cleaner and modern based he says, with much of the wood stained black to accommodate big pieces of art on the walls.
“I want to build environments that people want to be in, and I want to make the vision of the client happen, so I’m willing to build in any style or design,” Sears says. “I’m like a trout in a stream. I can’t stop swimming or I’ll suffocate. It’s always the next project I’m focusing on.”