Contact
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Locations
San Francisco Office(628) 203-98721388 Haight St Suite 1235San Francisco, CA 94117By appointment only
Custom Furniture in New York
Valley Studio builds custom furniture to designers’ drawings. Sofas and sectionals, lounge and dining chairs, benches, ottomans, headboards and beds — made to order at our bench in Long Island City, minutes from Manhattan, by a workroom that has been building to specification since 1985. We work with the trade across the New York metro area — Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Hamptons, Westchester and Greenwich.
From the House Collection
Pieces we designed and build ourselves in the Long Island City and Los Angeles workrooms. Every one is made to order — dimensions, frame, wood, finish and upholstery are set per order, so any of these is a starting point rather than a fixed product.
Sofa 01
A Valley tailoring classic with a pleated slip for every day ease
Chair 02
Simple elegance and comfort for any occasion
Chair 01
Informed by history for the modern sophisticate
Chair 08
A low pine lounge chair with a slatted back and loose box cushions
Table 04
A round oak table on turned legs that opens to seat the whole room
Cabinet 01
Balancing utility with unexpected charm
Chair 05
Bringing a sense of calm utility to spaces made for gathering, cooking, and daily life
Table 02
A meditation on restraint and refinement
What we build
The work splits two ways. Upholstered pieces — seating, benches, headboards, and wall and ceiling upholstery — go onto hardwood frames, tied or sprung to the drawing and filled for how the piece is meant to sit. Wood pieces — occasional tables, cabinetry, bed frames — are made or specified to the drawing and finished by hand.
A designer sends dimensions, a frame or a reference, and the goods; we build to it. There is nothing to order from a catalog, though the House Collection above is a reasonable place to start if you want a silhouette to modify.
A bench you can get to
The workroom is one subway stop out of Midtown, which changes what a New York designer can actually do during a build. You can look at a frame in muslin at eleven and be back at your desk by one, approve a welt or a cushion crown in person rather than off a photograph, and bring a client to see the piece before it is covered.
That matters most on the pieces that are hardest to describe in an email — a seat that has to be firmer, an arm that reads too heavy at full scale, a back pitch that is a degree off. Those are five-minute conversations at the bench and three-week ones by email.
Buildings, not just addresses
Most of what makes a New York delivery difficult has nothing to do with the furniture. We schedule around certificates of insurance, service-elevator reservations, freight-entrance hours and board approvals, and we ask for the building’s requirements at the order stage rather than the week of the install.
We confirm access before fabrication — door widths, stair turns, elevator car and landing dimensions — and build knock-down or in two pieces where a pre-war elevator, a tight landing or a walk-up requires it. Our own crews deliver and place the work; we don’t hand a finished sofa to a freight company.
How an order runs
Most orders run C.O.M.: you specify and ship the fabric or leather to the workroom against the order, and we confirm yardage off the drawings before anything is cut. Where a piece warrants it we build a deck or a muslin first and have the designer look at it.
Orders start on a 50% deposit, with the balance due before the piece ships. From payment, custom furniture made to your drawings — upholstered or wood — generally runs 16–20 weeks, and when a date moves, it is fabric delivery more often than the bench that moves it.
Summer installs out east need earlier drawing approval than the calendar suggests. The delivery windows compress once the season starts, so a piece that would ship on a normal schedule in February can miss a July date if drawings are still moving in March.
Frequently asked questions
- Can I fully customize a sofa or chair — dimensions, frame and fabric?
Yes. Every piece is made to order: overall dimensions, seat depth and height, arm and back profile, frame, fill and finish are set per order, and the fabric or leather is whatever you specify — usually C.O.M., shipped to the workroom against the order. Send a drawing, a reference photo, or a House Collection silhouette to modify, and we build to it. There is nothing to pick from a catalog.
- Do you work with homeowners, or only with designers?
Mostly with the trade — interior designers, architects and contractors — and also directly with homeowners. A direct client gets the same process: a written estimate from sizes, photos and fabric choices, a measure before anything is made, and one design partner as the point of contact through delivery.
- How long does custom upholstered furniture take?
Custom furniture made to your drawings, upholstered or wood, generally runs 16–20 weeks, and the clock starts at payment. That is a general range rather than a date: we give a firm schedule per order, and the fabric has to physically arrive before we commit to a delivery or install date. House Collection pieces and re-upholstery of an existing piece are shorter, generally 10–12 weeks.
- Where is the furniture made?
In our own Long Island City workroom, one subway stop out of Midtown. The frame is built in our framing shop and upholstered in our upholstery room; nothing is white-labeled and nothing is made overseas, and our own crews deliver and place the finished piece. A designer is welcome to come look at a piece mid-build.
- What does a project start with?
Sizes, photos and the fabric you have in mind. From those we prepare a written estimate — we can rough one in from your dimensions first, and we always measure before anything is made. There is no minimum order. An in-home design consultation to measure and talk through options is $250, waived on orders over $2,000. Orders start on a 50% deposit.
- How does C.O.M. work?
You specify the fabric or leather and ship it to the workroom against the order. We calculate yardage from the drawings and confirm it before cutting, so nothing is started before the goods are in hand and reserved.
- Can you meet my building’s certificate-of-insurance and delivery requirements?
Yes. Send us the management company’s requirements with the order and we will issue the certificate, book the service elevator and work inside the freight hours the building allows. Where a board has to approve the delivery, tell us early — that approval, not the build, is usually what sets the install date.
- Can you hold a finished piece until the site is ready?
Usually, yes. Sites slip, and a finished sofa sitting in a workroom is safer than one sitting in a construction zone. Tell us at the order stage if the schedule looks likely to move, so we can plan the storage rather than improvise it.
- What happens if a finished piece will not fit the elevator?
We ask that question before we build, not after. Where access is tight we construct in two pieces or knock-down so the piece assembles in the room. If a site turns out to be tighter than the survey, the piece is already designed to come apart.
Our New York Showroom
44-02 11th St STE 201, Long Island City, NY 11101
By appointment only · (516) 289-9661