The Food52 test kitchen that helped launch Sherman's career and develop a design trademark that blurs the line between home and office.

A wunderkind

from West

Bloomfield

brings comfort

to office

design.

Brad Sherman on a Casper mattress and a bed-
frame he designed

72

August 13 • 2015

JN

I

Julie Edgar

Special to the Jewish News

ere it not for a bandage he carried
in his bag, Brad Sherman might
be toiling in semi-obscurity like so
many other designers in New York City.
Three years ago, while cooking up ideas in
a co-working space called General Assembly,
the West Bloomfield native offered a bandage
to Merrill Stubbs, partner in a food company
called Food52 with food entrepreneur/writer
Amanda Hesser.
He mentioned his work as a designer and the
two women asked to see his portfolio, which
at that point consisted of his first and only job
out of grad school: a workspace that featured
wall dividers made from plastic bottles, desk-
tops from old doors and graffiti-covered walls.
Unrefined as it may have been, they liked his
"scrappy mentality" and hired him on the spot
to design their 6,000-square-foot workspace,
with testing kitchen and living room. His career
was launched.
"Having the Band-Aid was the most pivotal
moment in my life," says Sherman, LEED AP
(a designation from the U.S. Green Building
Council that denotes expertise in green build-
ing).
Working for Hesser put Sherman, 30, on the
map. He's become a go-to designer for tech
startups, including mattress-maker Casper,

organic-food delivery service Sakara and travel
site Skift, helping them refine their brand and
aesthetic through high-concept, cost-conscious
design. He creates workspaces that stand in as
showrooms, and he does it by mixing sustain-
ability, sophistication and comfort.
"There's no prescribed layout we can apply
across the board, but we've found that compa-
nies like comfortable environments. Maybe they
want a standing workstation, maybe a couch. By
creating mobility throughout the office, you're
getting people to move around, keeping them
energetic. They have a homier feel, which we've
found encourages employees to stay longer:' he
says.
Sherman's own aesthetic is shaped by years at
Cranbrook Schools (Class of '03), where "even
the windows have geometries. There's some-
thing inspiring and balanced there he says.
"The buildings, the furniture, the grounds — all
of those things influence the way I see design:'
Sherman studied metalsmithing while at
Cranbrook, a skill he is using in his own inte-
rior design and furniture line, B. Sherman
Workshop (pieces of which Food52 is selling
on its website as Brad Sherman for Food52).
He launched the line after he couldn't find the
perfect farm table for Hesser's workspace nor a
good bed frame for his Casper mattress.
Sherman graduated from MSU with a
degree in urban design and from Philadelphia
University College of Architecture with a mas-