Gat Creek furniture is handcrafted by employees who care.
While the furniture bears his name, he is quick to point out that it really comes from the dedicated work of more than 140 people who share a passion for woodworking. Gat Creek products are tangible stories, handcrafted by skilled builders. Meet a few of those builders.
Bob Cartmill grew up near Charleston, where the actual Gat Creek runs. Bob is a lifelong woodworker with a long family heritage with the craft. His great-grandfather built furniture and gave many pieces away to friends. People still approach Cartmill to tell him that they have furniture signed by his great-grandfather in their homes. Cartmill is leaving a similar legacy today.
James Becker started building furniture for Gat Creek in 1987. He had just moved to Pennsylvania from Kansas to help establish a new Mennonite congregation. Down the hill from his home is his workshop, which he once shared with his teenage sons when they were starting a business making wooden toys. Polly, a “high altitude” beagle, has now moved into the shop and is typically found napping high atop Becker’s machinery.
Willis Troyer lives and works on a farm that his father purchased in 1964. His parents operated a dairy and ran a bakery situated in a little barn along the road. They finally abandoned the dairy after realizing that “the little barn made more money than the big barn.” His shop originally served as a chicken house and later housed pigs and cattle. “The smell of this building today far surpasses the rest,” Troyer says. Pictured here with two of his five children, Troyer builds nearly all of Gat Creek’s huntboards and never complains about sawdust.