Profile: Marco Cecala

Marco Cecala of Phoenix, AZ is a talented craftsman, beginning a transition into full-time furnituremaking. Here is Marco’s story, in his own words:

I was born into a family of jewelry makers in the Buffalo, NY area. Growing up behind a bench, I developed an eye for detail and was a competent jeweler by my 10th birthday. With a soft economy in the Northeast, I chose to start my own jewelry business in Houston, where the economy was booming. When it went south, I turned to residential construction for my living.

I literally began in the trenches, but being a fast learner, I gained continual responsibilities, until I was promoted to an office job involving road construction for a developer. When computers were introduced for estimating and job construction, I was the first, out of curiosity, to flip the power switch, and all of a sudden, I was defined as the computer guy. As software advanced, I developed civil engineering applications utilizing GPS for construction machine control and formed my own business, Take-off Professionals.

Woodworking, initially, was an avocation; a creative outlet in contrast to the black & white nature of engineering. I made things for myself that were practical and Marco Cecala demonstrating routing for inlay. certainly functional—a kitchen table, a coffee table, chairs—but nothing that I would consider fine furniture. I did a series of little experiments, such as trying my hand at carving Federal furniture elements (fans and ball and claw feet).

As I was ready to push myself from pocket screws and biscuits to fine furniture, I started looking at what other people were doing and challenged myself to do what the big guys did.