We are currently available for phone calls, texts and emails.

We will be available for onsite work in mid-October, once the roads are clear and the gas shortage is ameliorated.

When we moved to the Marshall area twenty years ago, we fell in love with the little town on the river. It was pretty quiet back then. We used to joke that tumbleweeds would blow up and down the road, and the little coffee shop wasn't much bigger than a telephone booth.

​But it was our town, and it was home.

It was wonderful to watch it grow over the years. And being able to drive to downtown Asheville, or the River Arts District, and walk around and see all the beautiful art... well, that was just the cherry on top.

That's why I've been heartbroken by the footage coming from Marshall and the RAD, and other towns up and down the river. Many homes and studios were swept away by a mighty flood that crested at 27 feet above the usual river level. Even the river itself is somewhat polluted now - we watched huge propane tanks floating past our bridge, spouting plumes of gas from cracks in the tank.

And Marshall was just about wiped off the map. This was the highest recorded flood in history.

​I've seen people comparing this disaster to Hurricane Katrina, and other hurricanes in Florida, and saying it's worse here in Asheville. I don't know about that... at some point you really can't make comparisons. However I have to say that it looks like a lot to rebuild, and a long row to hoe.

But we love it here, and we are staying.

Our local emergency responders, as well as dozens of people with no particular title but with great big hearts, have been working hard to restore something like a normal life. We're grateful to say that we have power and internet already, and gas and grocery stores are already functioning, albeit with long lines. We're back in the office and taking appointments.

So if you'd like to support your local tradespeople (that's us!) please don't hesitate to call or email us. We're eager to get back to work, and happy to help with whatever you need.

I must say that most of our picture hooks leave very small and subtle holes; they're designed to make it easy to change your mind. But sometimes you just can't put holes in the wall.

Take this fireplace, for example. The chimneybreast was finished in dark modern tile with very narrow grout lines. If the grout had been wider, we might have been able to work with it, but with such narrow lines, the only option would be to drill through the tile. And of course, even with our greatest precautions, there's always the risk of cracking a tile.

So our client asked us to hang her art from the ceiling instead.

The trick with hanging art from the ceiling is that it can be difficult to make both supporting wires exactly even. But happily with a bit of research, we sourced a special steel picture-hanging wire with adjustable slides on one end.

​I really like this wire. It's woven, so it's very strong, but it's still fairly subtle and gives a clean look to the installation.

Even though the cable is adjustable, it's actually still kind of tricky to work with a big metal print like this. You need at least two people to lift it into place and adjust it safely. And in fact, you would probably end up taking it down and putting it up again a few times until it was perfectly aligned. It can be a little fiddly to get it just right.

Plus you have to use the right hardware to go into the ceiling... in this case, special steel toggles with screw-in hooks. It gets even trickier if you have a tall ceiling, because you'll need a ladder and a scaffold board.

But that's why we're here to help. And the end result is very nice.

We liked these cables so much that we decided to add them to our regular kit, and keep them on hand whenever possible.

​However, if you know you'd like to hang art from the ceiling, please let us know beforehand. That way we can consult with you on the best hanging system to use, and make sure the ceiling will support the weight of the piece.

As a professional art consultant near Asheville, I get to see an amazing amount of beautiful pieces both old and new. For a long time, my own personal style skewed toward traditional art, but lately I've really started to enjoy the broad range of contemporary work that's available in the western North Carolina region.

I suppose that's why I enjoyed this particular installation so much... the homeowner did an amazing job of taking old pieces and giving them a contemporary flair. It can be tough to marry old and new, but she did a great job of it.

It all started with a collection of original Audubon prints which her husband had gifted her for her birthday. She's a big fan of bird-watching, so they were the perfect present.

After consulting with us regarding her options, she purchased a set of identical "stand-off" style Plexiglass frames. You see these in use in a lot of commercial interiors, but it's not as common to see them in decor magazines, so it took a leap of the imagination to come up with the idea.

She had us mount each print in one of the frames, and I really liked the combination.

As I carefully set each piece into its Plexiglass sandwich, Arthur was busy laying out templates on the other side of the room.

Templates are often presented as an "easy" solution for making gallery wall layouts, but in fact they can be tricky if you haven't used them before, because they have to be correct to 1/8 of an inch in order to get the right layout. On the other hand, they really are the best way to preview your arrangement on the wall. We were glad we used them because we ended up expanding the whole layout once we saw it in the room.

And once they're in place, templates can very useful when it's time to mount the hanging hardware - or in this case, the hanging cleat.

I have to say, this project wouldn't be DIY-friendly. The cleats allowed for side-to-side adjustment, but the  height of each cleat from the floor had to be spot-on in order to make such a perfect grid pattern.

Fortunately our lead installer, Arthur, used to be a cabinet maker in his prior role, so he's got an eye for precision.

We caught the best view of the finished wall in our Instagram video... check it out and give us a follow if you haven't already.

And if you'd like a professional to install your gallery wall (to make it oh-so-neat-and-nice) please get in touch. We're happy to help.