You can still learn How Sam Maloof made furniture

I'd have to wonder if this has become 'necessary' to keep the business viable with Sam gone...

And further, what happens to the order baclog? Does Joe Rich Guy really still wanna pay $20,000 for a rocker 'the boys' built without Sam?
 
As far as I know Slimen Maloof, ( Sam's son) is following the bussines, or so I read in his book. I do not think that his latest orders were actually built by him although he kept and eye on them.

This brings back the never ending debate "Who is the artist? the one who has the idea or the one who executes it?" but this would be another thread.
 
There's no doubt that the artist is the one who designs the furniture. There's lots of examples of "names" in furniture who rarely or never made the furniture but their name is the one associated with it (Stickley is an example). After all, many people can build good quality furniture, but designing something "new" is really, really difficult.

Regarding the "day in the shop", I really doubt if that makes much money for the shop. I think they do it more as PR and to get their name out than anything else.

Without Sam's signature on the furniture, people will not pay very much for that furniture. It's essentially the same as anyone else building a Maloof rocker look alike. Lots of people build them, but they don't get much when they try to sell it. People paid $25K for a Maloof rocker because it had Sam's signature on it, not because of anything to do with the rocker itself.

The Nakashima family had the same problem when George died.

Mike
 
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