After outgrowing their former storefront and workshop in southwest Chicago’s Beverly neighborhood, Optimo, a leading maker of handcrafted hats, relocated to a 100-year old city firehouse renovated by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP. This two-story building boasts a contemporary industrial aesthetic with blackened steel architectural and ornamental metalwork paired with warm wood tones and rich leather details. Supporting the production of bespoke hatmaking, Bader Art Metal fabricated hatter’s benches accompanied by 12-gauge edge-welded slatted shelving units for hat forms and tools. Large mobile storage carts from rolled steel tubing effortlessly move across the first floor workshop.

Up on the second floor, the open studio space with large walnut table is anchored by a ten-foot diameter halo light fixture fabricated from roll-formed I-beam with LED uplight, while floor-to-ceiling steel plate shelves with tubular steel uprights are the perfect home for historical items of hatmaking past.