What's included in a furniture commission
A furniture commission runs through five steps — phone call, sketch, shop visit for timber selection, written quote, build. There's no menu of stock pieces; everything's drawn for the room it's going in, the people who'll use it, and the timber we agree on.
- Pencil sketches and one round of revisions at no charge
- Shop visit to mark the specific board / slab going into the piece
- Solid-wood construction — coastal Douglas-fir, BC big-leaf maple, BC black walnut as standard species
- Hand-cut joinery on visible joints (dovetails, mortise-and-tenon); machine joinery on internal carcass work where it makes structural sense
- Hard-wax oil finish (Osmo PolyX is the shop default) — seven days minimum cure on the bench before delivery
- Delivery within North Vancouver, West Vancouver and the Sea-to-Sky corridor; two-person on anything over fifty kilograms
- Five-year structural warranty written on the invoice
Dining tables & coffee tables
About half of the shop's work is dining tables. The build varies by base style, but the conversations cluster around three forms: rectangular four-leg, trestle, and live-edge slab on a sled. We'll talk through which one suits the room — and importantly, which is going to land best for the way you actually eat.
- Rectangular four-leg dining table, seats six — from $2,400 CAD in Douglas-fir, from $3,400 in BC walnut
- Trestle table, seats eight to ten — from $3,800 CAD, breakdown-friendly for a North Shore basement room with stair access
- Live-edge slab dining table on steel sled (we sub the steel to a Mount Pleasant fabricator) — from $4,200 CAD
- Coffee table, hand-cut dovetails on a frame base — from $1,800 CAD
Shelving, sideboards & consoles
Standalone shelving units and sideboards are the second-most-common commission. The difference between a "freestanding shelving unit" and a built-in (covered on the built-ins page) is whether it's anchored to the wall — anchored = built-in; freestanding = furniture.
- Open bookshelf unit, four to six shelves — from $1,800 CAD
- Sideboard with sliding doors, hand-fitted to the opening — from $2,800 CAD
- Console table for a hallway or entry — from $1,200 CAD
- Record cabinet with drawer storage for cables — from $2,200 CAD
Beds, desks & bedside
Bedroom and study commissions. Beds are usually queen or king; we don't build twin frames very often. Desks are split roughly fifty-fifty between sit-stand bases (we use the standard Jarvis frame and build the top to fit) and traditional fixed-leg.
- Bed frame, queen, with hand-cut joinery — from $1,900 CAD; king from $2,300
- Sit-stand desk, solid-wood top on Jarvis base — from $1,400 CAD
- Fixed-leg desk with drawer, hand-fitted — from $2,100 CAD
- Bedside cabinet, single drawer, matched to the bed — from $850 CAD
Timber we usually work in
We keep an inventory of stickered, kiln-dried timber in the shop. You can come down and lay your hand on what's going into your piece before you sign.
- Coastal Douglas-fir — the BC default, warm honey colour, ages beautifully, stable. Sourced from a Mainland sawyer we've used since 2014.
- BC big-leaf maple — pale, occasionally with quilt or curl in the figure; lovely for desks and shelving
- BC black walnut — the upmarket option, darker chocolate-brown, premium price. We currently have three slabs in the rack.
- Western red cedar — outdoor pieces only (it's too soft for an indoor dining table); benches, garden stools, planter boxes
- White oak, cherry, ash — sourced from a Burnaby wholesaler when the brief calls for it
We don't source rosewood, mahogany, ebony or any species under CITES restriction. We don't use reclaimed barn wood unless the client specifically requests it and signs off on the moisture-content risk.
What it costs
Furniture is quoted per project, not by the hour. The quote has three lines: timber at sawyer-receipt price, labour as an hours estimate, and a small materials line for hardware, glue, finish.
- Typical commission range: $1,800 – $6,500 CAD
- Deposit on signing: 35% of the total
- Mid-build progress payment: 35% on glue-up of the main carcass
- Balance on delivery: 30%
- GST 5% + PST 7% on labour and materials where applicable
- Delivery within the North Shore: included; Squamish/Whistler: trip fee quoted
Related services
- Built-In Cabinetry — for pieces that anchor to the wall
- Restoration & Refinishing — when the existing piece is worth saving instead of replacing
- Small Installs & Repairs — for shelf brackets, door rehanging and one-hour wood jobs