Where our things are made,
and what they cost us.

We went and looked.

We did not pick a factory off a website. We flew to Asia and walked the floors ourselves, because the only way to know whether someone can make a thing is to watch them make it.

We chose our partners for two reasons. Innovation — they solve the problems we bring them instead of telling us it cannot be done. And infrastructure — the machinery, the finishing, the tolerances, all in one place and all under control.

For home goods at our size, we could not find that in the United States. We looked. We would tell you if we had.

What a case costs us to make.

$70–$90 per case,
to produce

That is what the case itself costs us. It does not include the hardware — the hinges, the clasps, the plaques are all on top of that figure — and it is before shipping, before duty, before engraving, and before anyone here is paid.

Most brands treat that number as something to hide. We would rather you knew it, so you can judge for yourself what you are paying for and what you are not.

Solid wood, and a joint that costs us more.

Our cases are solid FSC-certified oak and walnut — the wood goes all the way through. Most of this category is veneer: a paper-thin layer of real wood glued over particle board, which looks the same in a photograph and behaves nothing like it in your hands.

The corners are rabbet joints. Almost everyone else uses mitres, because a mitre is two angled cuts and a bead of glue, and it is faster and cheaper every single time.

Mitre One 45° cut on each board, held by glue alone. Nothing locates the corner, so as the wood moves the line opens — which is why old mitred boxes show a gap at every corner.

Rabbet A step cut across the end of one board, with the other seated into it. More machining, more material, more glue surface — and a shoulder that holds the corner square while the wood does what wood does.

One corner, seen from above. Both boards the same thickness in each drawing.

We don’t white label.

There is a much easier version of this business. You walk a trade show hall of finished goods, choose one, put your name on the bottom and sell it as yours. Nothing is designed. Nothing is tooled. You are picking from a catalogue that everybody else is picking from — which is why you can scroll four different brands and find the same box under four different names, at four different prices, with four different stories attached.

Every piece we sell was drawn by us and tooled for us. Several of our designs are patented — which is only possible because they did not exist before.

If it already existed, we would not have made it. That is the whole test, and it is why the range is small.

What we have not solved.

Our metal sourcing is not where we want it. The hinges, the clasps, the plaques — we do not yet have the same line of sight into how and where they are made that we have on the wood.

We are working on it, and we will say so here when it changes. A page like this is worth nothing if it only lists the things already going well.

There is already too much made.

The world does not need another version of a thing that already exists, sold a little cheaper and thrown away a little sooner. So we make only what is not already out there, we make it to outlast us selling it, and we tell you what it costs and where it comes from. If that makes a thing cost more, that is the honest price of it.

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