Ken started the company with Joe in 2009 under the impression that eventually there’d be free pizza. Ken is a design nerd and furniture designer with a passion for photography and collecting weird things, like fruit stickers. He’s an active field trip enabler and enjoys bribing the team with Trailblazers tickets and empty promises that someday we’ll all get to see his expertly curated apartment. Check out some of his furniture designs here.

Sean is a man-bear hybrid who rules the woodshop with the ultimate weapon: love. His heart is so big he doesn’t have room for any other organs, and he’s got a PhD in Silliness. Alright, he does have a brain, but, it’s part of his heart -- it’s like a heart-brain. His heart-brain is SMART. This guy is a space camp graduate and a product design genius! He’s also got an amazing collection of embarrassing stories to make you cringe with joy.

Victor, aka Victor Sweet, aka Victor Strong is not only our awesome Production Manager but he’s also one of our most powerful Grovemaders. Victor’s secret for superhuman  strength? A steady diet of hip-hop, rap, R&B and heaping scoops of white hot magma. When through with his morning routine of deadlifting small cars and tiny houses, you’ll find him fishing the banks of the Columbia River, where he reels in trolley-sized carps with his steely bare hands and a visage of extreme aplomb. When not performing unmatchable feats of strength, you’ll find this dynamo enjoying the many tasty tidbits found far and wide in our fair city.

Dashia is the magical fairy of the woodshop; actually, she’s the magical fairy of everything good about Grovemade and life in general. When she’s not in the workshop, she’s building bookshelves at home or crocheting scarves and hats. Maybe all the gravel she sucked on as a child contributed to her talent with natural materials? Look out small stones, Dashia is a force of positive energy to be reckoned with. She’s also a loving Mom of two, and her true number one passion is family.

Linneah roller skated to Portland from her home in Montana, carrying only a Meyer lemon for sustenance. At Grovemade, she builds things and challenges herself, sometimes in that order, sometimes challenges first, building later. She shares her name with Linnea borealis, also known as Twinflower - perhaps this led to her love of houseplants? A mystery!  Outside of work, she’s a talented painter—you can check out her artwork here.

Max, named for the main character in Where the Wild Things Are, knows everything about every movie ever made. He’s got a passion for storytelling, from graphic novels and 80s horror films to Ray Bradbury. His resume paints a picture of a colorful life: projectionist, graphic artist at a modeling agency, bartender in foggy Astoria, photographer and videographer, and illustrator extraordinaire. Check out his illustrations here.

Nick is an accomplished toothbrusher. He used to do 20 pushups every night before bed, but he stopped a while ago and hasn’t looked back. Some of his favorite things are coffee, cooking while wearing aprons, throwing anything round, and music. Nick is our resident word-smith and idea generator and customer question answerer. He loves email subject lines and looking at numbers for a long time and then drawing graphs.

Kacy has a plan and his plan is to watch basketball later, after work. He likes to build things, at Grovemade and at home, things like custom PCs. On the basketball court, he uses magical mind-power and strong ankles to best his opponent. In the basketball arena, you can find him wielding whatever wild collectable cup they have because he goes “all out.”

Christian is a jack of all trades, but don’t call him “Jack”. Event planning? Check. Building everything? Check. Resident wakeboarder? Check. Producing a vodka brand? Check. He came to us from Lake Tahoe and the University of Oregon Product Design program, where he says he built a particle accelerator that fits in your pocket, but we think he was exaggerating. In his spare time he advises on ideal burger toppings and talks about his Subaru.

Joe is the other half of Grovemade’s founding pair, along with Ken. After six years of life changing challenges at Grovemade, he decided to switch things up and start a new paper goods company called Pacific & West. He continues to laser anything he can fit into his machine, including a line of premium customizable leather goods called Engrave Goods. 

Christof knows exactly one more thing about exactly one more movie than Max does. How? Well, by writing so many short stories. Short story authors, in contrast to long story authors, can watch more movies. And, in Christof's case, make more movies—including ones screened at the Northwest Film Center. And to top it off, one time they performed stand-up comedy in the Portland Art Museum. Brava, Christof!

Ben is a fellow of numerous talents. Here at Grovemade, he's our manufacturing engineer, meaning he commands our machinery to do as he wills! He also fixes them when they break and puts them on timeout when they disobey the rules. A dedicated father of two radical daughters, Ben also loves taking them to the backcountry for adventurous excursions. When the perfect river or stream is found, they bring in the fish with Ben's handmade rods and flies. In his free time, Ben is also hard at work inventing a robot that will sing his favorite lullabies as he prepares to dive into his daily afternoon nap. And beware of disturbing Ben when he's at rest—his prototype Lullaby Robot X-25 is also outfitted with lasers.

Sara is so good at learning about things, that sometimes you say, “When did she learn to do that?” But before you even finish saying that she’s learned about something else! She’s a chocolate enthusiast with a degree in design. She likes to ponder low-waste living and sustainability while biking to work, which is nicely consistent of her. Unsurprisingly, she excels at many things in the shop, from woodworking to customer service and writing.

Nozomi is a world-traveling musician and number wizard extraordinaire. She makes sure all of our business details have nice snug little homes where they don’t get lost or swept under the rug. In a past life, she was a scientist, and we all feel much smarter when she’s around. Her ideal Sunday includes Dim Sum - but she wouldn’t tell us about the rest of the day, because she says she really likes to be mysterious, so there you go.

Emma is our resident whistler and omnichord enthusiast—a musical predilection that suits our workshop well. (Whistle while you work, am I right?) Moss and lichen are her favorite growy-things, which are quite suited to the Pacific Northwest. Outside of building things at work, you'll likely find Emma doodling. Doodling what? Wouldn’t you like to know?

Gerardo once ate an oyster with an actual pearl inside. He keeps the pearl—his good luck charm—in a little glass bottle. As far as we're concerned, this is plenty of high quality biographical information, but we'll tell you a little more—Gerardo loves Esports, and once completed a Dot-to-Dot with over 2000 dots. That’s called patience, folks!

John is the master process-optimizer and efficiency aficionado in our shop, where he gets his hands dirty each day building beautiful products. He is a Portland native, and, so, naturally, he’s also an accomplished rock drummer. He has a rad collection of bikes, which he uses exclusively for cruisin’. He likes the Flaming Lips, and suggests that if you see them live, you should pay attention to the drummer.

Justin's a laid back guy who enjoys the finer things in life: a Tom Collins, a clean haircut, and the finest of contemporary cinema (Young Guns II; Cool Runnings; The Mighty Ducks). With a voice reminiscent of radio men of yon, Justin's soothing baritone brings an exuberant calm to the woodshop.

To start with a bang: Gillian once made eye contact with Paul Giamatti while he was inside of a dumpster. She dabbled in stand up comedy, until she decided she hated it, and now she holds down the fort at Grovemade. Gillian is a published poet, is good at making soup and has some very particular daydreams about adopting (direct quote here) "a bunch of grumpy geriatric chihuahuas."

Jim is an efficiency enforcer with a heart of gold, hailing from the ever expanding Chicagoland beast in Illinois. He's passionate about anything embodying variety and balance at the same time—think tightrope walking octopi, or sumo wrestlers practicing yoga. Jim can hold his own on the soccer field, chess board, yoga mat, and conference room. He and his wife Sarah annually host a short film festival and an audio festival through their creative group, Yumi Life.

Caroline is an inter-continental dog-rescuing field hockey-playing curbside treasure-hunting extraordinaire. She's considered starting a TV show about renovating houses using only found furniture, called "Kicked to the Curb"... or at least, she could consider it, if she wanted to. She likes homemade baked goods and lavender scent. And, probably, lavender-scented homemade baked goods. Or homemade baked goods which contain lavender! Oh, the possibilities!

What's the longest bridge in the world? Who produced "The Godfather II"? Which oceanic current is used by migrating humpback whales? Just wanted to kick things off with some trivia, which is Seann's forte! Not only is he good at trivia, but he also likes disco, retro video games, and antiquing. The past, to Seann, is a rich playground for exploration. At Grovemade, you'll find him being extremely helpful.

You know how there's always random stuff around, stuff that just doesn't have a good place to be? Anthony knows the solution—build a container. Or a stand. Bingo. Now that thing has a place. Anthony is a surprisingly good dancer (he used to teach breakdancing in high school) so he might celebrate his organizational victory with a quick dance. A Portland native, he is enthused by the outdoors. In particular, the Pacific Northwest outdoors. Bloom where you're planted, they say, and Anthony couldn't agree more.

Wren has climbed 57 of the 58 14,000-foot-tall mountains in Colorado. The final one is on private property, but perhaps she'll summit that one day, too. She loves knitting and flamin' hot cheetos, but never at the same time. When she's not at work building things in our shop, you’ll find her en route to the desert of Southwestern Utah.