Inside New York City's Hidden Design Gems

About This Episode

On this episode of Brand on the Run, Casey Brand brings us along to New York City for a day of friendship, design, and discovery. She starts in DUMBO, a corner of Brooklyn she had never visited, with Tracy, her best friend since they were 16. The two met in San Diego, and in a turn neither saw coming, both ended up in the design world: Tracy now works with designers, developers, and builders at Royal Green, a New York source for high-end appliances.

They walk the cobblestone streets beneath the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges, trade stories about what drew Tracy to the city in the first place, and wander into Fishs Eddy, where Casey is reminded how much personality a well-stocked shop can hold, and how simple a good day can be with someone who has followed you through home stores for three decades.

In the afternoon Casey heads to Architectural Grille for a behind-the-scenes look at the renowned shop and its craftsmanship. Stephen Giumenta, whom she first met in Mexico a few years earlier, tells the origin story: his grandfather started the business as a custom fabricator in the Bowery before moving to the Gowanus area, and in the 1980s his father and uncles built it into a product line of HVAC grilles, decorative screens, room dividers, and artwork. Stephen shows her custom brass door pulls, perforated patterns drawn from his travels through Asia, Italy, and Mexico, and the Frank Lloyd Wright designs the company makes as a licensed manufacturer for the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation.

On the factory floor she sees raw brass, bronze, and aluminum stock, interchangeable tooling on the presses, hand welding, and the finishing room where every color and polish is made. She meets Angel, a cutter who has been with the company for 30 years, and gets an early look at the brass pieces Stephen designed as a giveaway for C.Next, Cosentino’s designer summit. Casey leaves with a changed view of HVAC: not an afterthought, but a detail that, planned early with the designer and mechanical contractor, can shape how a room finally feels.

“Curiosity has an incredible way of connecting us. Not just to remarkable places, but to remarkable people.”

Casey Brand

What You’ll See

• A walk through DUMBO and beneath the Brooklyn Bridge with Casey's best friend of 36 years
• A browse through Fishs Eddy's Brooklyn shop
• The four-generation story of Architectural Grille, from the Bowery to Gowanus
• Frank Lloyd Wright patterns made under license, and Stephen Giumenta's own travel-inspired designs
• Presses, welding, and hand finishing on the Brooklyn factory floor
• Why vents and grilles deserve a designer's attention early in a project