A small studio, built on time and on ten-mile drives.
Todd Michael Design is an interior design studio based in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. The studio was founded in 2011 and has since completed work on some forty houses — most of them within an hour of the office, many of them over a period of years rather than months.
Our story.
Todd founded the studio in 2011, after nine years as a senior designer in New York, with the specific intention of working only on houses he could visit in a single morning.
He grew up in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and trained at the Rhode Island School of Design and — by way of a long apprenticeship — in the kitchens and millwork shops of southeastern Pennsylvania. The studio is a continuation of that apprenticeship. We work with the same masons, the same cabinetmakers, the same upholsterer, and the same painter we did in our first year.
Today the studio is seven people, in a converted dry goods storefront on Lancaster Avenue in Bryn Mawr. We do not have a showroom. We do not keep a website beyond this one. We take five projects a year and we do not advertise.
How we work.
Every project begins with a visit to the house. We walk every room, open every door, and stay long enough to see the light change. We then take six to eight weeks before proposing any direction at all.
We do not produce renderings. We draw by hand, we build samples, and we source in person. Budgets are transparent from the first week. We do not mark up furniture.
Full-Service Interiors
Whole-home engagements spanning architecture, millwork, finishes, and furnishings. Typically 18–36 months. The great majority of our work.
New Construction
Collaboration from the ground up, in partnership with a small roster of Pennsylvania architects and builders we have worked with for years.
Renovation
Additions, kitchen and bath renovations, and careful restorations of historic houses. Often the most rewarding work we do.
Furnishings Only
For clients whose architecture is already resolved. We work slowly, source widely, and do not deliver until the house is truly ready.
Gardens & Exteriors
In collaboration with landscape architects. We believe a house begins at the property line, not the front door.
Consultation
A limited number of single-visit consultations each year, for clients who need direction but not a full engagement.
Walk & Listen
A site visit, a long conversation, and usually a second visit two weeks later. We do not quote before we understand the house.
Scheme
Six to eight weeks of hand drawings, plans, and finish samples. Presented in person, over a single long afternoon at the studio.
Make
Procurement, millwork, upholstery, and construction. Every sample is approved in the room it will live in.
Install
A quiet week or two of install. No reveal, no photographer on day one. We ask that you live in the house a full season first.
"It took two years. I would not have given up a single week of it."Margaret HolcombeDelancey Place · Philadelphia