Quote it once
Every proposal is a fixed price with a written scope. If we mis-estimated the work, that is our problem, not a change order.
About
A garage on the west side, seventeen years ago.
How a one-man bookcase job turned into a six-thousand-square-foot millwork shop in Detroit.
The owner
William Nussbaum
Owner and lead joiner. Twenty-six years in the trade, the first nine of them hanging doors and running base for a commercial trim crew in Warren.
William started Oak & Ember in 2009 after a general contractor cancelled a kitchen two days before install and left a homeowner in Rosedale Park with a room full of boxes and no doors. He finished the job himself over three weekends. The referrals from that one favour kept him busy for a year, and by 2012 he had leased the first bay on Nash Street.
He still writes every estimate personally, still measures the majority of jobs, and still refuses to quote a price he cannot hold. If you call the number on this website during shop hours, there is a good chance he is the one who answers it.
“A cabinet is a promise you make to a room for the next
thirty years. You either build it like that or you find another line of work.” — William Nussbaum
Milestones
Seventeen years, told briefly.
2009
First commission
A set of hard maple bookcases for a house on Outer Drive, built in a two-bay garage with a borrowed jointer.
2012
Nash Street, bay one
1,400 square feet, two employees, and the first real dust collection system.
2015
Finish booth
Bringing spraying in-house cut lead times by eleven days and ended the era of finishing kitchens in customers’ garages.
2018
CNC and a wide-belt
Panel processing became repeatable to a third of a millimetre. Hand work moved to where it belongs: fitting, scribing, and detail.
2021
Commercial division
A five-office fit-out in Ferndale opened a second line of work: reception casework, slat walls and conference joinery.
2023
Restoration bench
A dedicated bench and knife library for reproducing historic Detroit trim profiles, now used on roughly one job in five.
2026
Seventeen on the floor
Six thousand square feet, eleven benches, two install crews, and a calendar that still books six to nine weeks out.
How we operate
Four rules the shop actually runs on.
Build it here
No white-labelled boxes from a catalogue plant. Panels, doors, drawers and finish all happen at 2634 Nash Street.
Say the real date
We book fewer jobs than we could so the schedule stays true. A held date is worth more than a cheap number.
Leave it clean
Drop cloths, dust extraction, shoe covers, and a swept floor at the end of every install day. Non-negotiable.
Materials & standards
What goes into the box matters more than the door.
Anyone can show you a pretty door front. The parts you cannot see are where a cabinet either lasts thirty years or starts sagging in five.
- Cabinet boxes in 3/4" domestic pre-finished maple plywood — never particleboard.
- Solid maple or walnut drawer boxes, machine-dovetailed, sealed inside and out.
- Blum Tandem undermount runners and soft-close hinges as the standard, not an upgrade.
- Built to AWI Custom Grade tolerances; Premium Grade available on request.
- Low-VOC waterborne and conversion finishes sprayed in a dedicated, filtered booth.
- Hardwood purchased kiln-dried to 6–8% moisture content from two Michigan yards.
The team
Owner & Lead Joiner Eight cabinetmakers Two finishers Two teams of two One draftsperson One coordinator
Seventeen people, most of them for years.
William Nussbaum
Estimating, site measures, shop drawings and the final walkthrough on every project.
Shop floor
Panel processing, door machining, assembly and dovetail work across eleven benches.
Finish room
Colour matching, sample panels, sealing and topcoats in the filtered spray booth.
Install crews
Scribing, hanging, adjusting and punch-list work in your house or office.
Drafting
Elevations, plan views and hardware schedules, drawn before a single sheet is cut.
Office
Scheduling, deliveries, invoicing and the phone when the shop is loud.
Free, no-obligation estimate
Tell us about the room, and we’ll tell you what it costs.
Most conversations start with a photo and a rough measurement. Send those over and we’ll come back with a realistic range the same week — before anyone books a site visit.
Reach William Nussbaum
- Phone
- 806-873-7390
- back-up@xxienanpur.anpur.org.br
- Workshop
- 2634 Nash Street, Detroit, MI 48219
- Hours
- Mon–Fri 7:00am–4:30pm ET