Meet Justin Whiting of Zheven Designs in Austin/Cedar Park

Today we’d like to introduce you to Justin Whiting.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Justin. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I have always made things, from drawings to jewelry to cars to furniture to homes I have always enjoyed creating. It is what makes me happy. But when I moved to Texas from the coast of Oregon in search of a new adventure, I thought going to school and having a degree could somehow fill that desire to become someone that had the credentials and skills and live the dream that everyone seems to have. (get an education, get a good job and be happy with a decent income) I got the great job and I was pretty content. I was able to build things and contribute to the team and had fun working at national instruments. It wasn’t long before I felt that I wasn’t making enough money and decided to do some handyman work on the side which quickly built up to doing some fun projects for some great clients/friends.

So I quit my job which was a very difficult decision and very scary for a long time and jumped into finding new clients. One family and their siblings and parents and step-parents kids gave quite a bit of work and are still there with work and friendship. It has been really incredible working for such wonderful people and building some really cool projects for them. One of the small side projects I have done are boom boxes. The first for my son, it was done very cheaply. Used speakers and a small tripath amplifier and it sounded incredible! Reigniting my passion for music. I had to make it better though so the next one had Bluetooth and a battery and also sounded incredible and would play music continuously for over 12 hours on one charge. The boomboxes continued and still have some demand and the fact that I don’t have one for myself having sold all of them means I need to build more. Another project I built while still working at NI was a teardrop travel trailer. I had no idea the amount of interest it would generate.

People would ask about it every time we made a stop for gas or food or to sleep. It was really fun to have that interaction. It was sold a few years ago to a very nice lady who was touring the us with her boyfriend in a model T in name of cancer awareness. The television show tiny house nation came to town and a friend of mine from high school is the lead carpenter. He gave them my name and they asked me to join a build in cedar park, it was lots of fun and lots of work after the week was over they asked me if I would like to join them in New Mexico for another build and I couldn’t say no. It was so much fun to hang out with such creative people and work so hard and so fast. Soon after that, I was asked to do another show; he shed she shed. I helped some really wonderful people build a tiki bar shed in their backyard and then another episode of a Tron inspired shed and another of a champagne inspired shed and another with a rancher inspired shed. I got to know all of these homeowners and was having such a great time building really fun projects. Tv really goes after the wow factor, so projects are really interesting and often times complicated. I love a challenge. In there somewhere I started another teardrop travel trailer and sold many boomboxes and built a lot of cool things and also a bit of the mundane handyman type stuff.

Another tv show asked me to be their build producer; I was flown to Connecticut where I helped renovate five homes and then on to L.A. to renovate another 5 and was away from home for six months. I found Connecticut to be incredibly beautiful and met quite a few really great friends. On to la where I met many more great friends who I got to work with. Upon returning to Austin, I was asked to do another “house of the future” show episode and most recently I was construction producer for a home music studio renovation show on CMT with one of the former hosts from the shed she shed. The television business can be tons of fun and a lot of work simultaneously. it seems that most of my life I have told people to have fun I suppose that is most important to me in being happy i is the search of fun

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
About nine months into quitting my job at NI I had a lull in work and got very nervous, I kept in touch with my former manager and asked if they might want to rehire me and as it turned out they had an opening in my old department, I applied, they hired a different guy but by the time all of that had happened I was busy again and wasn’t worried.

While I was working in Los Angeles the water line in my home broke and flooded it the day before I was scheduled to go home for Thanksgiving, the whole five days I had at home were filled with dehumidifiers and fans. It was so loud and hot. They took the equipment away the day I left. over Christmas break I installed new flooring, it was beautiful. The day after I left a different water line going to my water heater rusted through flooding part of the house again. Very stressful from that far away.

Being away from my son while working away has been difficult for both of us.

Zheven designs – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Zheven designs is a build/design company; I love to build furniture and cabinetry and travel trailers and boomboxes and tiny homes and…….. anything you want to build I want to help. people are only limited by their imaginations.

probably specializing in bathrooms and kitchens.

I believe what sets me apart is my passion for what I do. I thoroughly enjoy challenging projects with creative people.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Probably when I realized that people really value me and my work. I am not really sure when that happened exactly.

Contact Info:

• Website: zhevendesigns.com
• Phone: 5412513588
• Email: justin@zhevendesigns.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zheven_designs/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zhevendesigns/

Image Credit:
Justin Whiting

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