we are blurring the lines between contractors & craftsmen
“Our passion extends beyond design and construction. Our team is dedicated to our customers satisfaction. We take pride in our work, and for this reason we insist on top-notch quality. Our work is our legacy; we want to ensure that it is an accurate representation of ourselves.”
founders, brothers & craftsmen: Jake & Luke Herring
The Herring Tradition
The Herring-hell-for-stout mentality has been passed down for four generations. It started with Vernon (Pa) Herring, born in 1899. His furniture craftsmanship was born out of the necessity of a time where people re-used because they had to. He would say, “Might not be pretty, but she’s hell-for-stout;” Besides, it was his wife’s job to make it pretty. Her task was upholstering, and Pa wouldn’t ever be able to move fast enough for her liking. She would put a modern pneumatic tack-gun to shame with a mouthful of furniture tacks and a magnetic hammer.
About the time his son, Ed, was born Pa began working for a pipeline company for steady work. He was a laborer on a crew with eighteen men. Somehow they came to a collective agreement that they would all build each-others homes. With all of their pooled savings, they purchased a theatre on an abandoned air force base outside Lubbock, Texas. They sold everything from the seats to the projector, and gutted the building’s massive timber beams. In 1942 they bought eighteen acres in what is now Midland, Texas, and drew numbers. Pa was number four, and it was on his lot that the table saw and planer was set up. He would soon become the unofficial foreman for the job. Ed was only twelve at the time, and he would soon spend each day for years to come turning the vision into reality. These were the days of true craftsmen, and this is where our Grandfather, Ed, would earn his degree in resourcefulness.
Our father, Russ, marked the third generation. He was at the ripe age of 7 when Ed gave him his first tool apron. According to tradition, you must learn how to care for your tools before you are allowed to use your father’s. Just one rusty screwdriver found in the lawn would mean no access to the circular-saw, so the learning curve was steep. As he demonstrated his respect for the tools of the trade he was given shop space. (This is not to be taken lightly) The first thing our father did with his real-estate was to screw the lids of baby-food jars to the underside of his “workbench” mimicking his Pa’s method of hardware management. You do what you can with what you have.
Growing up along the fence-lines of our ranch in Oklahoma, we spent our days on the tractor, in the shop, and anywhere Dad was working. We learned the same traditions that our fathers knew. Our desire to work with our Dad meant that we had to respect our [his] tools, use our resources wisely, and build it right the first time. He taught us to plan ahead. He taught us that a Herring-hell-for-stout project is built with the future generation in mind… it is built to last. As we grew older we were allowed to spend summers working in Texas with Grandpa Ed. A fire-station one summer, a car-port the next… we would have worked on the banks of Lake Palestine all year if it weren’t for school. This is where we learned our finest lessons in the art of carpentry, and more importantly: about integrity.