Melbourne-based designer-maker Josh Carmody is making a bold statement about craft, community, and material integrity. In his latest creation, the Lost Profit Workshop, Carmody’s creation is more than a class; it’s a repositioning of the designer’s role in shaping meaningful and enduring fine furniture.
An internationally awarded furniture designer with a reputation for refined architectural forms, Carmody has developed a workshop experience that puts the tools and the creative power directly into participants’ hands.
Over four or five days, individuals design and build their dining tables under his expert mentorship, using the same commercial machinery and traditional hand tools he uses in his professional practice. The experience begins with a custom online design tool that guides users through a curated selection of typical design typologies, such as four-legged or slab-based frames.
This digital component allows for quick, accessible engagement while setting the foundation for a highly tactile, hands-on workshop process. Material selection plays a pivotal role in the new venture.
Participants work primarily with American white oak and black walnut.
These are the species that Carmody uses in most of his work, and he says they provide structural integrity, beauty, and workability. Using these as the base timber options for his new venture, Carmody says, is also ‘an appeal to a broad market’.
“Many interior spaces base their timber aesthetic around a blonder, white oak palette or a darker walnut colour palette, so starting with these timbers means that we can cover a broad range of preferences simply.”
Josh Carmody – an internationally awarded designer behind the Lost Profit Workshop.
“It’s also down to the fact that most respected furniture brands available commercially in Australia make furniture in these timbers, and I feel a new bespoke furniture experience that I offer with the Lost Profit Workshop should offer premium material as a standard.”
Carmody’s approach is rooted in craft education.
Participants gain practical knowledge in the fundamentals of working in solid wood, such as understanding seasonal movement, which is a critical part of designing solid timber and is the knowledge the consumer has lost in the age of flat-pack assembly. He also teaches participants how to maintain their creations and repair them if needed over time.
But perhaps the most powerful aspect of the Lost Profit Workshop is its emotional resonance.
These are not just tables but future heirlooms, vessels for family connection and daily ritual. Having created several pieces for his growing family, Carmody is aware of the table’s role in family togetherness, especially when the end user makes it. His motivation for making a table in American white oak and black walnut is “to bring the focus back to sitting down together as a family… to set some good routines and boundaries for when we sit down to eat together.”
This is ambition is echoed by many participants in his new venture. In blending digital design tools, expert guidance, and quality American hardwoods, Carmody is reinvigorating the idea of making and owning furniture. The Lost Profit Workshop is a rare opportunity for participants to step into the maker role and create something deeply personal and professionally crafted.
- To learn more about American hardwoods – and its growing appeal in the Australian marketplace – click here for Wood Central’s exclusive interview with Rod Wiles, Regional Director for the American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC) in Africa, the Middle East, India and Oceania.
