Our Vision

Collage of colorful reclaimed wood products made by Mutual Adoration in Detroit

Quality and Design:

We’re not the only craft shop you know, not even the only one in Detroit. Yet, we know our quality of work and our level of design set us apart. Everything at Mutual Adoration is built by hand right here in our studio in Detroit.

Our style is contemporary, but our methods are traditional. While we use old materials and are committed to building pieces that will last, our outlook — and output — is modern. We were artists by trade before we ever picked up a saw or hammer.

How We Design:

Take a visual artist and a photographer, give them some tools and a pile of old wood, and see what happens. Actually, that’s pretty close to how we began.

Clare is the design visionary and Wayne is the good-with-his-hands tinkerer. Clare dreams it up, and Wayne makes it happen. Clare designs the pieces and Wayne works backwards, reverse engineering each product idea...from finish to start. Together with our skilled team, we turn ideas into functional pieces.

We indulge in paint and stains. We use tools the “wrong” way to achieve the look we want. We push the limits, dreaming up odd new uses for old pieces.

And when we’re done? We sand, coat, finish and polish our wood pieces with natural oils and waxes. Some items get multiple coats of polyurethane to protect them during everyday home usage. We don’t just want you to look at our products. We want you to actually use them!

What can we do with a pile of old windows? A stack of painted doors? Flooring from a long-shuttered pharmacy? How do we combine traditional woodworking techniques with a contemporary design aesthetic using materials with already-built-in stories? The experimentation and the challenge is constant and we love it.

reclaimed wood working in Detroit at Mutual Adoration