Custom

When the Job Does Not Fit a Standard Spec

Not every project fits neatly into a standard cabinet size or a catalog countertop shape. Curved reception desks, architectural millwork built around a specific design concept, a piece that exists nowhere else because the space calls for something nobody has built before, these are the jobs that separate shops that can build anything from shops that can only build what is easy. We have taken on that second kind of project for four decades, and it is usually the work we are proudest of once it is installed.

CBBE has been doing commercial millwork in the Southeast since 1985, and our custom work runs alongside our standard production out of the same Canton, Georgia facility. Our skilled custom craftsmen are the same people building teller counters and cabinet runs every day. Custom work is not handed off to a separate shop or a subcontractor. It stays in-house, start to finish.

What We Mean by Custom

Custom covers pieces that do not come from a standard detail or a repeatable drawing. Architect-designed reception desks with unusual geometry, millwork that incorporates mixed materials in ways that are specific to one building, lobby features tied directly to a client's branding, curved or angled elements that cannot be assembled from stock parts, all of it falls under this department. If a piece is one of one, it comes through custom.

How Custom Work Moves Through Our Shop

Custom pieces get more attention from our engineering team upfront, because there is no prior drawing to fall back on and no room for a dimension to be off by guesswork. Once the drawings are approved, our craftsmen build the piece largely by hand, in the places where a machine cannot replace a person who understands wood, solid surface, or metal well enough to make a one-off piece come out right the first time. We stay in close contact with the architect or designer through this process, because a custom piece usually involves a decision or two that only makes sense to resolve by talking it through rather than guessing at what was intended.

Custom Does Not Mean Compromise

Some shops treat a one-off piece as an excuse to relax their standards, since there is no second unit coming behind it to compare against. We do the opposite. A custom piece gets the same material standards, the same finishing process, and the same inspection before it ships as anything coming off our production lines. If anything, we hold custom work to a slightly higher bar, because there is only one chance to get it right and no production run to catch a mistake before the client sees it.

Talk to Us About Your Project

If you have a piece that does not fit a standard drawing or a design element nobody else seems willing to take on, that is exactly the kind of work our custom department was built for.

Call (770) 924-1242 or email info@cbbe.net to get started.