How commissioning custom furniture works, start to finish
Commissioning is a conversation that ends in an object. You describe what you need, a maker asks questions and quotes, you agree on design and price, you pay a deposit, they build it over the following two to six months, and it is delivered and installed. The whole process runs eight to twenty-four weeks for most pieces. The part buyers underestimate is the front end: the clearer your brief, the faster and cheaper everything after it gets.
Reviewed
The seven stages
| Stage | Who drives it | Typical duration |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Brief | You | A few hours of thinking |
| 2. Maker selection and first conversation | Both | 1 to 3 weeks |
| 3. Quote and scope agreement | Maker | 1 to 2 weeks |
| 4. Design, drawings, samples, approval | Maker, you approve | 2 to 5 weeks |
| 5. Build | Maker | 6 to 20 weeks |
| 6. Finishing and final approval | Maker, you approve | 1 to 3 weeks |
| 7. Delivery and installation | Maker or freight | 1 to 3 weeks |
Stage 1: the brief
Write it down before you contact anyone. At minimum:
- What the piece is, and what it replaces or sits next to
- Dimensions, including the constraint that matters most, which is usually a wall, an alcove, a doorway, or a stair turn the piece has to come up
- How it will be used. Daily dining with children is a different brief from a formal room used six times a year
- Wood species, or a color and tone direction if you do not know species
- Reference images, three to five, with a sentence on what you like about each
- Your budget range, honestly
- Your deadline, and whether it is real
That last pair is where buyers hurt themselves. Withholding a budget does not get you a better price, it gets you a quote for something you cannot afford and two wasted weeks. And "no rush" invites a maker to schedule you behind three other jobs.
Detail on all of this in our guide to writing a commission brief.
Stage 2: choosing a maker
You are hiring a person for a months-long project. Judge on:
- Relevant work. Not just good work. A maker who builds live-edge slab tables beautifully may not be the person for a fitted Arts and Crafts bookcase wall.
- How they answer questions. A good maker interrogates the brief. Someone who quotes immediately without asking about your floor, your use, or your delivery access is guessing.
- Whether they say no. Makers who tell you what will not work are the ones to hire.
- Capacity and honesty about it. "I can start in March" is a better answer than a lead time that quietly slips.
Ask to see something they built five years ago, not five weeks ago. Furniture reveals itself over time.
Stage 3: the quote
A real quote breaks out design, materials, labor, finish, hardware, and delivery, and states what is excluded. A single number with no breakdown is a number you cannot negotiate or compare.
It should also state:
- What happens if you change your mind after drawings are approved
- Whether the quote is fixed or an estimate, and what triggers a revision
- Who pays for material price movement on a long build
- Delivery, and whether it includes carrying the piece into the room
See what custom furniture actually costs for the cost drivers.
Stage 4: design and approval
Depending on the piece, this is anything from a sketch and a wood sample to full measured drawings and a mockup. What you want from this stage:
- A drawing you have actually read, with dimensions on it
- A physical finish sample on the actual species being used. Do not approve a finish from a photograph. Look at it in the room, in daylight and at night
- A written confirmation of what was approved, with a date
This is the last cheap moment to change your mind. After this, changes cost money, and after the build starts they cost a lot of money.
Stage 5: the build
Expect to hear from your maker at intervals, not continuously. A reasonable rhythm is a photograph at rough milling, at dry assembly, and before finishing. Agree the rhythm up front rather than chasing.
Things that legitimately cause delay: a board that reveals a defect after milling, a hardware backorder, wood that needs to sit longer to acclimate. Things that do not: silence.
Stage 6: approval
Look at the finished piece before it leaves the shop if you can, or at delivery if you cannot. Check dimensions against the drawing, check the finish in daylight, and open and close every moving part. Raise anything now. Reasonable makers fix things. Nobody enjoys a complaint that surfaces three months later.
Stage 7: delivery and installation
Sort this at quote stage, not at the end. Large furniture is genuinely hard to deliver. Measure your doorways, your stair turn, your elevator, and your ceiling clearance, and tell the maker the numbers. A dining table that does not fit up the stairs is a solvable problem in the design phase and a disaster on delivery day.
Ask specifically whether the quote covers threshold delivery, room-of-choice delivery, assembly, or installation. These are four different things.
What it costs
Most commissions fall between $500 and $10,000, with a median around $2,500. Trade and contract projects, where a designer or business furnishes a whole space, reach roughly $150,000.
Where a given piece lands depends far more on size, joinery, finish and species than on what category it belongs to, which is why there is no useful price-by-piece list. Full breakdown of the cost drivers in what custom furniture actually costs.
How this works on Maker Marketplace
- Start a commission. Describe what you need: vision, dimensions, materials, timeline. The more detail, the better.
- You are matched with makers whose craftsmanship fits the project, across furniture, metalwork, textiles, ceramics, and more.
- You work directly with your maker on design, materials, and details, with the conversation, drawings, and approvals kept on the platform.
- Payment runs through the platform, so the money sits alongside the agreement and the record rather than in a separate email thread.
Every maker is vetted. No dropshippers. Every piece is made by an independent maker in the United States.
