We recently connected with Casey, Brandon Smith and have shared our conversation below.

Casey, Brandon, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

Path Design was born from an idea that the traditional stepping stones that society has largely put in place is not the only way to achieve success. For most of my life, I believed I would go to high school, then to college, then get a 9-5 type job, buy a house, have a family and work until I retire. That seemed to be the narrative for me and a lot of my peers. Once I got to college, I found myself, a historically conscientious student, feeling less and less motivated to be in school. I craved a something different and believed in myself more than I believed in any professor or lecture.

When I was eight, my parents took on the renovation of my grandmother’s house. That experience sparked an interest that would stay with me through adulthood. I loved working with my hands, creativity was a strong force in my life and the idea of creating something from nothing was powerful. Coincidentally, Brandon shared a similar experience at this age. His family built a house as well and so at the young age of eight, just a few blocks from each other, Brandon and I were first introduced to things like subfloor and drywall, grout and 2x4s.

After completing one semester of college, I made the decision to drop out. Over my first winter break, I took on my first few woodworking jobs and felt drawn to the shop (my parents’ basement at the time) more than any classroom. These feelings were compounded by frustrations with the higher education system. I felt like a hypocrite for criticizing a system that I was a part of. I felt such a strong desire to break from that system and show that there is an alternate path to success.

I remember the day clearly. I was sitting in one of the first Humanities classes of the semester. My professor started each class with 10 minutes of stream-of-consciousness writing. He would dim the lights and play meditation music. I began to write and quickly my thoughts turned to actions, ‘I’m going to drop out of college.’ What a liberating moment that was. I was on the cusp of making a drastic change in my life and, in that moment, I was the only one who knew. A favorite Ralph Waldo Emerson quote of mine came to mind, ‘Do not go where the path may lead, go where there is no path and leave a trail.’ That is what inspired the name of our business.

I met Brandon in 2018. I was working for a home-staging company part time while building a tattoo portfolio. Brandon was in his last year of college as a media student. I was drawing and painting on tables in my down time and Brandon was looking to do a documentary style short-film on a subject. He found me. We met to talk about the project and quickly realized how much we had in common. He shared my belief of taking life into your own hands and going against the grain if it suits you.

We shot the documentary, moved in together and started a business all within the first six months of meeting. Up until I met Brandon, Path was an ideology, it was a business still in its conception. Path took shape after Brandon came on board. We found a local warehouse space for rent for $800/month and converted it to a workshop. We started spreading the word about what we do and secured our first few projects and once it started, it never stopped.

We got our start building rustic farmhouse dining tables. It was a great way to learn the ropes and develop our style. We’ve since transitioned to hardwood and taken on projects ranging from built-in breakfast nooks and commercial spaces to a full camper remodel. Our skills have never been more refined and our creativity never more present. Path Design is a testament to finding success on your own, however non-traditional your journey might be. I was a Valedictorian turned college-dropout and Brandon was a college graduate with a Bachelor of Arts Degree and yet we both ended up in a wood shop covered in sawdust. There is no set rule book to follow.

Our mission with Path Design has been and continues to be to bring high-quality, well thought out custom pieces of furniture to each and every individual we work with. Our focus is on the combination of art and functionality. Style and practicality are key when it comes to the pieces you choose to fill your space with. Not to mention, the added benefits of bringing the outside in and incorporating elements found in the natural world into the home is not only healthy, but helps to promote a love and appreciation for our environment. Paying homage to nature never goes out of style.

In addition to quality and biophilic benefits, in a society in which so much is created to be disposable, replaced after a few years, we strive to design and build furniture that will withstand the test of time, something that can be passed down to the next generation. In doing so, we reduce the amount of waste that is being put into the environment and reintroduce the idea of looking at furniture as an investment. A dining table for example, something some may view as simple, is where friends and families gather to share meals, tell stories and make memories. It becomes a centerpiece for hard conversations and celebrations alike. Something like that deserves to be designed and built with care and that is our mission.

Casey, Brandon, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Back in 2006, when I was just eight years old, my parents took on the renovation of my grandmother’s house. Walking home from school everyday and suddenly being in the center of a construction site was very exciting for me. Anything I was allowed to do, I did. I painted, I cut and grouted tile and from that point on, I had a desire to work with my hands. Coincidentally, Brandon shared a similar experience at that age that must’ve laid the foundation, in one way or another, for his interest in home and furniture design.

Brandon and I fell into woodworking. We both had a desire to combine art and functionality, we both understood the significance of how the space around you and how you choose to use it impacts the way you interact with your environment and live.

At Path, we specialize in designing and building custom furniture. We’ve encountered so many instances where our customer was looking for something specific but either couldn’t find it or simply wasn’t satisfied with the quality of products the big box stores had to offer. We experienced this ourselves and that is why the idea of custom furniture appealed to us. We could design and build whatever we wanted, whatever someone needed, any size, down to the inch, any color, any finish. We could create unique and one-of-a-kind pieces that not only function better and last longer than massed-produced furniture, but they’re also made of higher-quality, sustainably-sourced materials and are tailored specifically to the styles and needs of each individual customer.

Brandon and I are incredibly proud of our growth not only as business owners, but also as individuals. Starting and running a business is no small task and challenges and learning experiences are around every corner. We’re proud of how we’ve handled ourselves and how we’ve continued to refine our skillset and infuse more of our own creativity into our work.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

About six months after Brandon and I met, we began looking for commercial spaces. We were lucky enough to come across a local warehouse building with a unit for rent. We called the property manager and set up a meeting to see the space the following day. It was a 25′ x 25′ storage unit with heat, AC, running water and no direct access to outside. While this might not have appealed to everyone, we knew right away that it was the perfect blank cavas for us. We signed the lease that day.

We got to work right away. We build a very modest work shop while waiting on our first order. We were in that space for three years and over the course of those three years, we acquired more tools, added more work tables and reworked the space a time or two when we needed more space.

At the start of 2022, we got word that the building our shop was in sold to a new owner. Not long after that, we noticed our fellow commercial tenants starting to disappear. Turns out the new owner wanted the entire building to himself and he began kicking everyone out one by one. We did what we could to ensure our current lease covered us through the end of our term (June of that year), but commercial leases don’t often offer many protections for the tenant and so, sure enough, we come into the shop at the end of March, and slid under the door is a Three Day Notice to Quit. We had three days to pack up and get out. A few weeks prior to receiving this notice, we spoke with the new owner and he assured us that if we were in his way in our current unit, we could finish out our lease in another unit on the other side of the building. Needless to say, this notice came as a bit of a shock to us.

We had work tables and shelves full of tools, a massive wood rack filled with material for upcoming projects, current projects in the works and nearly finished, plywood, scrap wood, an entire wood shop that, over the next 72 hours, we dismantled, packed up and moved into our home garage.

Going from such a wide open space where we had the freedom to work whenever we wanted to a shared home garage seemed, at first, like a tragedy. Commercial spaces had doubled, some even tripled, in price since COVID and, after getting so abruptly kicked out of our previous space, renting didn’t seem like the most attractive option at that point. We had to figure something out.

Little by little, we made space for everything we needed to set up shop again. It was much more compact, but it forced us to be more selective about the projects we take on and to focus on one element of a project at a time. After focusing so much on building as much as possible, and working on three, four, sometimes five projects at a time, this was quite a shift for us. One we never thought would’ve been as beneficial as it’s proven to be.

After pulling back on our volume of work, we were left with a bit more time between projects. That time gave us time to step back and reassess our situation. Are we content with where we are? Where do we want to go and how do we get there? It was during this time that we began to look at ourselves not only as builders, but as designers too. We started to figure out how to infuse more of our own creativity into these projects, and just like that, we increased our value. We could now bring another skill to the table.

That shift in perspective has resulted in us designing and creating some of our best work. Not to mention, we’ve enjoyed the process of bringing these designs to life more than ever before, and all of that was a result of us getting kicked out on three days notice.

Can you share one of your favorite marketing or sales stories?

A few months ago, we were presented with the opportunity to build reception desks for a commercial business franchise. We were tasked with recreating a desk that had been built before. It was a very generic design that didn’t incorporate any natural materials. Given the scale of this project in addition to the franchising opportunity, we were potentially dealing with a large sum of money. Needless to say, we were torn.

Brandon and I sat with this for a couple of days, and when we talked to each other about it, we both felt similarly – yes, recreating this desk is something we could do, yes, this could be a great opportunity for us both professionally and financially, and no, we didn’t want to recreate a design we didn’t believe in. Those sorts of projects, the ones you take on purely for the profit, end up being the least satisfying. You can imagine the guilt that comes along with the thought of turning something like this down.

We decided to counter their initial proposition with a design of our own, something we wanted to do, something we believed would be functional and visually striking. It was a risk, but one that felt worth taking. Not long after sending that email, we get a reply. They’re open to doing something different. Great, that’s a win!

We meet and they tell us that they spoke to a lot of other businesses, that one of the reasons they decided to go with us was because we were willing to throw what already was to the side and come up with something new and innovative. That, for us, was incredibly reassuring. Our risk paid off. From that point on, we realized that our insight into the world of design is just as valuable as our woodworking skills.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.pathdesign.us
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pathdesignco/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pathdesignco
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0svuml9VtfPvZdBS5kAfyQ
• TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@pathdesignco

Image Credits
Path Design