Holton Studio Frame-Makers and Stained Glass Garden are among the two dozen makers giving tours.
BERKELEYSIDE – September 30, 2025
About two dozen local artisans and craftspeople are opening their doors to the public with free tours during Berkeley Manufacturing Week, Oct. 3-9. Among them are two businesses celebrating 50-year markers, Holton Studio Frame-Makers and Stained Glass Garden, both in West Berkeley.
Holton Studio Frame-Makers
Tim Holton owns Holton Studio Frame-Makers, a custom frame shop in West Berkeley’s industrial district. He counts Berkeley’s architectural heritage as one of his direct influences.
“I wanted to be an architect when I was a kid,” said Holton. “I was born and raised in Berkeley, so Bernard Maybeck’s houses and the city’s Arts and Crafts tradition were very important to me from a young age.”
Holton got into frame making in 1975 while he was still a student at Berkeley High School and said he fell in love with the craft.
“Frames are architecture at its most refined,” he said.
Holton attributes his shop’s uniqueness to heeding the Arts and Crafts movement’s “rebellion against industrialization” and its call to “get back to handwork.” While other frame shops cut down factory-made, pre-fabricated molding to size and assemble frames with metal fasteners, Holton Studio works in the preindustrial tradition of what Holton calls “joiner’s frames” — frames made by real woodworkers using proper joinery (the shop specializes in mortise-and-tenon joinery) and handwork, including carving.
The three skilled woodworkers in Holton’s workshop take each project from raw lumber all the way to the finished frame. Frames are available in a variety of woods and finishes — domestically sourced white oak and walnut are popular options.
All this isn’t just extra work for the sake of it. Holton believes that “a picture can only be well-framed if it’s in a well-made frame.” And he says the architectural quality that solid wood and sound joinery bring to a painting helps “restore the primal link between pictures and architecture.”
His frames can be found in homes, galleries, museums and restaurants; Holton built the custom frames for the many mirrors in Chez Panisse’s two dining rooms.
The studio serves art enthusiasts from across the country and even internationally, all from the woodshop on Fifth Street. Holton estimates that at least 40% of the shop’s business these days comes from online — and out of the area.
“We’re the only ones in the U.S. doing this,” Holton said. “Even framers will come in and say, ‘I’ve never seen anything like this.’”
Holton said he feels fortunate to have been born in Berkeley, where he was exposed to the great works of the Arts and Crafts movement and its successors, and where running a truly craft-based business like his is viable — barely.
After 50 years of working to revive the art and craft of framing pictures, he believes he’s offering a viable alternative to the conventional industry model. “If it’s possible to do anywhere, Berkeley is the place to do it.”
His shop’s annual show, “Beloved California”, will feature Northern California landscape paintings — in Holton Studio frames. It opens Nov. 15.
Stained Glass Garden
Another heritage art that thrives in Berkeley is stained glass. The Bay Area, said artist Julie Orchard, was one of the epicenters of the studio glass movement of the 1970s — a stained glass counterpart to the blown glass renaissance associated with Washington State and artist Dale Chihuly.
In addition to being a glass artist and designer, Orchard is the general manager and gallery director of Stained Glass Garden, in Berkeley’s Fourth Street shopping district. She also teaches some of the studio’s classes, which are equally popular as opportunities for team-building, personal enrichment or even launching a new career in studio glass.
“It’s really cool to see the careers that we’ve launched here,” Orchard said. “One artist I can think of — Barbara DeVeer — came in for a one-day fusing class, where she learned how to make glass earrings in a kiln.”
“Now, DeVeer has launched this giant business and her work is sold in museum stores throughout the country, all from this one class,” she said.
Tucked behind a retail shop just a few steps from the main Fourth Street thoroughfare, on Delaware (next to Sur la Table), Stained Glass Garden is sometimes overlooked.
“I often hear from people, ‘I didn’t know you existed.’ But we were the very first store on Fourth Street when this district was being imagined,” Orchard said. The redevelopment of the once-derelict dirt street into the walkable shopping district of today began in the late ’70s, by design-build firm Abrams/Millikan.
Artist Joan McLean and her brother Bruce founded Stained Glass Garden on Fourth Street itself in 1976 at the forefront of the area’s redevelopment. That building was later torn down, and Stained Glass Garden moved to its current location around the corner.
Orchard, who had studied art in college, joined the team in 2004 based on her bookkeeping skills, fell in love with glass and set herself up to learn everything she could about stained glass, fused glass, and mosaic art. By 2008, she had taken over operations while McLean relocated to Southern California.
Today, Stained Glass Garden maintains a steady business of commissions and manufacturing, partnering frequently with interior designers and homeowners as well as craftspeople in search of a beautiful, one-of-a-kind piece of stained glass.
The shop also hosts a gallery space, bursting with works by local and nationally recognized artists. A retail component offers glass-making supplies and tools. In addition to its custom stained glass fabrication, the business supports a thriving community of glass artists of all types through its many class offerings.
Like Tim Holton, Orchard appreciates being located in a city that nurtures creatives who excel at their craft.
“Berkeley seems to be its own treasure trove of arts and creativity and community-oriented people,” she said. “There’s a lot of collaboration amongst the various artists and manufacturers here. And there’s a lot of support within the community for small business. We have wonderful customers.”
WHAT NEXT
- Register now to attend Berkeley Manufacturing Week 2025 tours (Oct. 3-9), organized by the City of Berkeley Office of Economic Development. Explore Holton Studio Frame-Makers and Stained Glass Garden, along with artisans in the Sawtooth Building (Susan Brooks, Giselle Shepatin, Thomas Pedemonte, Bill Burch), Artworks Foundry, Berkeley Potters Guild, Metro Lighting, Adams & Chittenden Scientific Glass Coop, and Berkeley Potters Studio. The series will also feature Berkeley Kitchens (Batter Bakery, Cult Crackers, EC Confections/SoDo Donuts & Petite La Fleur), Boichik Bagels, Covenant Wines, The Cultured Pickle Shop, Hammerling Wines, TCHO Chocolate, Takara Sake, Third Culture Bakery, Trumer Pils Brewery.
- Celebrate the 50-year anniversary of Stained Glass Garden with a group show “Golden Hour,” Oct. 4, 4-6 p.m. at a public reception, and celebrate Tim Holton’s 50th year as a framemaker at the opening reception Nov. 15 for his shop’s annual “Beloved California” show, featuring Northern California landscape paintings.
- Visit the Discovered in Berkeley Stories page to find more articles about inspirational local businesses.
