A business by design

Adam Zeisel takes his grandmother's creations from museums to the Internet

Adam Zeisel arrives at Crema Café in Harvard Square wearing a T-shirt, backpack, and cargo shorts. He's your typical 25-year-old, except that after coffee he's driving to New York to visit his famous grandmother and talk business. Adam is the grandson of Eva Zeisel, the Hungarian-born designer, whose elegant, curving pottery is not only part of permanent collections at museums around the world but available at Crate & Barrel.

The younger Zeisel, a Northeastern graduate, wants to see his grandmother's legacy extended still further, burnishing her reputation as a furniture and home-accessories designer. Together, the duo are unveiling a new generation of designs through his online store, evazeiseloriginals.com. Adam says he hopes to attract a fresh audience with "a brand new Eva."

That's a challenge when your celebrated grandmother is nearly 102 years old. But Adam is undaunted.

"I want to add a chapter to Eva's legacy," he said, "and make her remembered as a great furniture designer."

It started with six glass goblets that Eva designed in 2001, inspired by some martini glasses she'd created for a Bombay Sapphire ad. Adam's father, John Zeisel, encouraged her to raise them up to "a celebratory height" of 12 inches in honor of her 100th birthday. The pieces literally stood out from the more modest work she'd been doing. John Zeisel suggested his son manufacture and market them.

"It was my idea, my dream, but he had the business background," says John, who runs a facility for Alzheimer's care in Woburn. "He understands quality, cares a lot about what he's doing, and cares a lot about his grandmother. He's not about to sacrifice those things for a quick buck."

Adam, then in college, moved forward. He didn't know a thing about design, but saw an opportunity to do something entrepreneurial on his own terms - and spend more time with his grandmother. He put the goblets online in 2006 and two sold for $500 apiece.

Next, he hired a Canadian company to reproduce Eva's carved-wood tables, which were designed in the 1990s for a nephew's office. Rather than use modern straight edges, she applied the same fluid, organic approach to wood that she famously did with ceramics and glass. The result was sexy, curvaceous, feel-good furniture, which remained undiscovered until Adam brought it to the masses.

Last fall, he partnered with Design Within Reach, licensing a coffee table and gaining visibility and credibility in return. Michael Moreau, who runs the Cambridge DWR, says it's very difficult to get a new design into the company's line, and Adam had no track record. However, he was impressed with Adam's knowledge and knew the item would fit, provided there was supply and quality, so he put him in touch with the buyers.

"It's quite a complex thing to start a business out of thin air," Moreau says.

Adam knew as a 5-year-old growing up in Cambridge that he wanted to go into business when he was older. Every summer he had a lemonade stand, and after Halloween, he'd sell his candy back to the kids at school. He enrolled in Northeastern's co-op program in 2001, which promotes experiential education, allowing students to take six months of classes then work six months at various companies. Adam worked everywhere from the sales floor at Marathon Sports to the manufacturing facilities at Braintree Laboratories.

"I loved working with my hands," he said, "which figures that I'm the grandson of Eva."

When it came time to develop his own business, Adam sought advice on production, promotion, and distribution from one of his professors, Ted Clark, the director of the Northeastern University Center for Family Business.

"He didn't come to me with a big idea," Clark said. "What he had was really achievable and opportunistic . . . it was something that he could strategically address and create."

The professor could be objective since he didn't have a stake in the company and he helped Adam parlay a one-shot opportunity into something much larger. He knew that Eva's legacy could be damaged with a bad product so he played hardball with Adam, preparing him for negotiations.

"He's not just hawking tables and furniture - he's increasing value for his grandmother," Clark said. "He's doing people a favor exposing them to something they're going to enjoy for the rest of their lives."

Now past the initial investment stage and 80-hour workweeks, Adam is starting to turn a profit. Even in this economy, he managed to sell four tables, which run $1,500 to $4,000 each, in the past month. In November, he'll debut a lounge chair made with organic materials that will coordinate with the coffee table.

In a phone interview from her New York home, Eva said these pieces are her inheritance to him. She hopes he will manage the business for as long as he wants to. "Imagine a grandson who sells his grandma," she said.

Adam vows that even after Eva passes away he'll only sell designs that she has approved. On visits to her New York country home he's watched her meticulously perfect each piece until it's ready for her signature, admitting that some nights he's had to go to bed before her.

As a kid Adam received her designs for Christmas or birthdays, but had no idea how special that was. Three years ago Eva gave Adam and his brother silkscreen prints, right before they went to be displayed and sold in limited edition at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. The print hangs in his Roxbury Crossing apartment, which he shares with three roommates and a cat named Sophie.

"There was always a meaning behind what she gave us," he said, "but it took me years to realize what that meaning was."