Steve Morris has an affinity for metal. He works steel and copper, bronze and aluminum into sculptural pieces to decorate both interior and exterior spaces. He adds glass or wood, and creates furnishings and lights. His stainless steel staircases, often mixed with glass and wood, make sweeping visual statements that turn ascending and descending them into dramatic acts. “What do I like about metal? It has incredible strength for the volume of it. It opens up possibilities; you can get a really light look with something that is really strong.” Like using wire cable and one-inch metal posts on a deck railing, for example—materials that do not obstruct the view. He points to a giant flower under construction and notes that you couldn’t make the thin, crumpled petals out of wood and expect them to hold up as well as they will in metal.
In what was once a bus garage built in the forties, Morris and a crew of two produce one-of-a-kind furnishings and interior installations, offering customized design options to homeowners, builders, architects, and business owners. He’s been at it since the mid-nineties—dedicated to being personally involved in every project—and considers that having such a small overhead gives his business a competitive edge. This doesn’t sound like something you’d learn in business school. It would seem that even a custom craftsman might benefit from practices of mass production. This craftsman, however, walks to a different beat. “I’m selling myself, really. It comes down to a personality thing. I advertise on my Web site and by word-of-mouth—and I’m as busy as I can be right now and not have to hire more people.”
Morris’s inclination to engage in his craft as artfully as he can while still winning and satisfying customers represents a work philosophy perhaps developed through his previous years of jewelry making. With multiple employees to keep busy then and the fashion industry to cater to, his business sense was well-honed. “It’s tough if you have an artistic mindset, and you tend to not think about finances … really the fear of survival drove me to work every day. And I’m not a great employee. I’d rather take the risks and have to pay attention to those things, to be responsible.”
The leap from making jewelry to sculpting life-sized birch trees in stainless steel or crafting tables of polished metal mixed with driftwood and glass was not as great a transition as it might seem. The metalworking itself involves many of the same techniques, only on a larger scale. Morris’s shop is filled with big equipment—forklifts, multiple pneumatic table lifts, welders, a plasma cutter and an old milling machine. An interim career in the building trades rounded out his skills. And so he meets with clients, talks over their desires and ideas, hand sketches possible solutions, and then builds precision works of shining beauty. He indicates the joints on a walnut, etched glass and stainless steel staircase and says, “I have a good mathematical sense and a natural ability to see the steps that need to take place to put stuff together. I don’t really know how I know. I guess you just get a sense for stuff.”
In addition to specializing in custom staircases and handrails, Morris has done complete renovations on a number of restaurants. He shows me the before-and-after photos of Ziggy’s in Bridgehampton. The transformation of the space into what Morris calls “sixties modern and beachy,” softened by sea grass, bleached wood and muted stainless steel is stunning. He grabs a small box off a window shelf—a collection of butterflies and bugs, and one dead hummingbird. “This flew into my friend’s car and ended up on the dashboard.” It’s the model he used when making 4 ½- by 5-foot hummingbirds to grace the top of a client’s gate. Using these actual creatures as models gives him a more accurate sense of proportion. Figuring out how to construct an armature and attach literally thousands of metal feathers was the challenge. He seems to delight in puzzling it out. “If you have a certain energy, you want to keep learning as you get older. It helps to keep vital.”
The current economic crunch notwithstanding, there has been a subtle shift in the way we consumers choose to spend our money. We want to experience authenticity and integrity in the things with which we surround ourselves. Committed to creating superb structures of beauty, working small, attending to one client at a time—it’s a work ethic that suits him and provides his clients with that satisfying experience. You can catch him at Steve Morris Designs, 156 Broadway, Route 9W, Port Ewen, NY.
For more examples of his work and further information, see www.stevemorrisdesign.com.
