Uh oh...
It appears that you're using a severely outdated version of Safari on Windows. Many features won't work correctly, and functionality can't be guaranteed. Please try viewing this website in Edge, Mozilla, Chrome, or another modern browser. Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused!
Read More about this safari issue.
For the founders of Mahogany & Hyde custom woodworking, the symbolism of a table goes deep.
“As a company, we believe wholeheartedly that community and relationships are best built by breaking bread with one another around a table… Tables allow vulnerability, intentionality and more time to truly know and be known by others. So our mission is to build community around our tables,” says their website.
Owners Cody and Laurel O’Neal have found a receptive design community and custom home market in central Arkansas, from where they produce and ship their pieces nationally. Cody has family roots in both Oklahoma and Texas, but he grew up in Bentonville, while Laurel grew up in Little Rock. The couple spent some time in Alaska, and on the drive back south in 2020, when Laurel took a position at UAMS, they started talking about what they actually wanted to build with their life. “That’s when Mahogany & Hyde stopped being a side project and became the plan,” Cody says.
Their craft heritage runs equally deep. Cody, a third-generation wood craftsman, learned and inherited his desire for fine woodworking from his father, stepfather, maternal grandfather and paternal grandfather. He runs the day-to-day operations and handles sales, design direction and client relationships. He is also the face of the brand. Paul Milholland is the shop lead and runs production. Cody describes him as the craftsman – turning what they design with clients into finished pieces.
Cody defines heirloom furniture as an item built to outlive the person who bought it. “That means solid hardwood instead of veneer over particle board, real joinery instead of staples and glue, and finishes that let the wood age into character rather than fall apart,” he explains. “If your grandkids can’t use it, it wasn’t heirloom.”
The quality is especially important for a dining table, which Cody says is the most-used piece of furniture in a home, used for meals, homework, hard conversations, holidays and board games. “That’s where life actually happens,” he says. “We build tables big enough for people to gather around and durable enough that nobody worries about a scratched finish or a spilled glass of wine.”
So perhaps it’s not surprising that tables are his favorite item to create – specifically, tables that anchor the communal space of the homes they inhabit. “For my own family, gathering around the dinner table every night has become one of the most important rhythms we have,” he says. “It lets us slow down, put our phones away, ask about each other’s day, pray, eat good food, and actually invest in our kids and in the people who share the table with us. That’s what I want our tables to do in other people’s homes too.”
And Cody says they see this happen. “The table itself does the work,” he says. “When someone brings a piece like this into their home, something shifts. A beautiful, usable table draws people in. It leads to more meals at home. It leads to people congregating around it. It leads to the hard conversations that would otherwise get pushed off. It leads to inviting friends and neighbors over, being hospitable, breaking bread with one another.”
In addition to dining tables, doors are the most popular custom order. Although tables get the most attention from homeowners, Cody says doors are usually the entry point for the designers and custom home builders they partner with. “Doors sound boring until you see one installed,” he says. “A well-made hardwood door is the first thing someone touches when they walk into a space, and it sets the tone for everything past it. Most people have never owned a real one. Beyond those, we do a lot of built-ins, faux beams, bookcases, hutches and bar tops.”
Walnut and white oak are his favorite woods to work with because both age beautifully and work cleanly. They also fit the clean mid-century modern look their clients tend to gravitate toward.
“Both are local to Arkansas too, which matters when clients want regional wood, or wood that came off their own property,” Cody says. “We’ve done that more than once. A tree from a client’s land, cut and milled and dried on site, then built back into a piece that lives in their home. One of my favorite stories is a dining table we built from a tree that the wife and mother of the family used to swing on as a kid. Now her own children eat around it every day.”
Mahogany & Hyde work on an appointment basis from their shop in Little Rock. They have past clients who are happy to host walk-throughs of installed pieces in their homes. They also work directly with individual homeowners on custom commissions, and they partner closely with interior designers and custom home builders on doors, dining tables, built-ins and bar tops across Arkansas and out of state.
We do the work.
You check your email.
Sign up for our weekly e-news.
Get stories sent straight to your inbox!
Like this story? Read more from April Fatula
If you grew up in Searcy, chances are you have heard about the 1963...
Right after I graduated from college, one of the best things I did was...
If your teenage son or young adult is struggling with substance abuse or...
Join the Conversation
Leave a Comment