My Palace in Dallas: Andrew & Tevah Godfrey

“Solitude requires you to move past reacting to information created by other people and focus instead on your own thoughts and experiences – wherever you happened to be”

— Cal Newport, Digital Minimalism

As I sit in my apartment typing this intro, I continue to wonder, what have I accomplished this year? What random yet basic habit have I picked up on? Sourdough starters? Day drinking? Gained the quarantine 15? Learned how to give myself a haircut? Aside from all these things that helped that endless void in my heart, I’d like to believe I came out of this quarantine experience stronger and able to appreciate the chance for total solitude.

This is the exact idea that gave birth to this project, I want to know, I want to see, more importantly, I want to document what the people around me have become after this unprecedented year, they can be artists, comedians and they can also be the people you meet daily on the street (which is quite hard cause apparently people in Dallas don’t walk at all). What is it that they do? What are their stories and what does their Palace in Dallas look like?

Without further ado, allow me to introduce you to Andrew &Tevah Godfrey, an amazing and powerful who created Sostenuto Studio and they possess immaculate tastes not just in their selection of furniture but also within their own crib! I had the pleasure of being introduced through my friend Jay and can’t wait to let y’all see what lies in their beautiful apartment and the great chat we had on a cozy Sunday afternoon!

**Hi Andrew and Tevah, thank you for having the time to sit with me, now before I start bombing you guys with questions, would you mind telling the world who are you and what is it that you do?**

**Tevah:** I am a full-time department manager at Anthropologie at north park center
**Andrew**: I am a full-time graphic designer, and we are both the founders of Sostenuto studio!

The furniture business is going well from what I’ve been seeing (Big Congrats on the success with the latest drop!) but what I wanted to know most is what got you two started Sostenuto? Curating an amazing collection of furniture must’ve been an amazing journey!

Tevah: I have a background in styling, retail, working with products, content creation, and Andrew is a full-time graphic designer. We kind of realized that we have a mutual passion while possessing different valuable skillsets. With our interest in entrepreneurship and you know, newly married, just got a dog, and needing a hobby, we felt like we needed to have something we can be passionate and happy about and connect over outside of work.

We are pretty different in interior tastes as single entities but trying to figure out what our aesthetics look like as a married couple was a really fun journey. Halfway through we realized that we are fairly decent at finding stuff for ourselves and maybe this could be something amazing! All these mindsets, passion, and needs all led to the birth of Sostenuto on Feb 21th, 2020, which coincidentally is our joint birthday!

Andrew: We are still in the beginning stages, contrary to popular belief the studio is a newborn baby but it’s really cool to see how consistent it can be and we are excited to see where this goes.

Andrew and Tevah doing what they love the most, having coffee while bathing in the afternoon light.

I wouldn’t be surprised to hear this is how the business came to be because Dallas has always been filled with strong start-up energy! Now tell me this, when you two first started out looking for pieces was it from the standpoint of what you would like to have in our own place?

Tevah: We took our entire birthday weekend (because we share the same birthday) building out our brand and really thought it out, drawing inspiration from many places, and decided that our brand would be “We wouldn’t sell the piece unless it is something we want in our own home”. The journey has been amazing as we have evolved a lot since our first drop and now we have that shared mindset to be able to immediately say yes on what pieces to bring in for our drop.

Andrew: The biggest obstacle for us at first was, we are aware of how many vintage Instagram shops are there with the same model but I believe we found our style and our niche along the way, and we really want to stay aligned with every single piece we’ve sourced with our brand identity. The more we have consistently aligned the more success we’ve seen. It was like having the realization of “ Wow! The types of furniture we like are actually also the type our audiences gravitate towards”.

Tevah: In a sense, it really was that cliché saying of “Being true to yourself”, we don't want to be like other vintage dealers and our success comes from those who also felt like they didn’t want pieces that are like everybody else’s.

I like how the light hits Andrew in this pic also isn’t their wall just, amazing?

This might sound dumb especially coming from someone like me who isn’t in the industry at all. Now with your floor being this unique in comparison to normal households, would your direction on furniture sourcing change if your floor was different? In your sourcing process do you think of how these pieces would look like in other floor types as well (Hardwood, carpeted…etc)? It does feel like the Sostenudo pieces sprouted from your place so I’ve been curious to see if that was ever a concern throughout your sourcing process.

Andrew: It’s actually really interesting because we started our business when our old place was all hardwood floors and yes, our current place was evidently different from that. Even during our launching process, we have always desired this look and this place aligned with our style in a way that it actually completes the aesthetic and look even more. This is the look we’ve aimed for even when we were in our old place and I think now, living here, is actually the 100% of how our business should look like on the page and in real life as well.

Tevah: We were faced with something not many people have which is looking for a place to live and also looking for a place for our business to thrive. These criteria might not be the top priority for people who are on the hunt but we wanted a place that fits Sostenudo but also somewhere we can enjoy ourselves. Like Andrew said we started out with hardwood floors but when we moved in here something in us just clicked really came alive.

When we are sourcing our pieces, I think we come in with the mindset of what works for all types of floors but living here does help make our vision reach its full potential, and we are really happy with it.

Andrew: This also ties in the part where we always encourage our customers to show us photos of their space where our pieces go into and how they are able to incorporate and compliment their style despite being in such varied environments. It’s encouraging and inspiring even!

One of my favorite shot for this article, it’s soft and warm like their owners.

I know we’ve touched on a lot of things earlier but would you mind giving more details on your journey together creating such a wonderful business?

Andrew: I think when we first started, we knew there are stuff that we’d like to do but one of our biggest lessons is learning to trust our taste, like, “this is who we are and we hope you will like it”. When we first started out we were so afraid of whether the pieces would sell or not, we forgot to focus on what was most important which is being ourselves. The more comfortable we got with our choices and how people reacted to them the fear kind of withered away, and we wouldn’t panic as much if it doesn’t sell because we have our niche, and sticking to it will always be our goal.

(Tevah: If it doesn’t sell we just end up keeping it! *laughs*)

Tevah: Ideally, we were newly married, working full time, and wanting to build something that resembles more of us than our jobs are. Realistically we have a craving we want to fulfill and we saw this as an opportunity to build a mutual interest for us, while also being something that could work for both of our schedules.

The name of the studio comes from a place that holds a great deal of meaning in our lives. To set the scene, Andrew and I are both musicians, I play the piano and Andrew plays pretty much any other instrument out there. Now, we wanted to find a name that can reflect both of us, as a result of that, Sostenuto is a word I found online in a musical dictionary and it’s an Italian word for “Sustain”, which means to sustain the note.

It hits me because sustaining, and in other words, prolonging, is exactly what we are doing for the furniture. When we find the pieces that match our vibe, we are essentially giving them a breath of second life, it is prolonging the value and Sustaining the pieces! Ultimately, we would love to also work on fixing, rebuilding the pieces but because of time restraints it is still on the board but we do offer some fixer-upper projects here and there.

Andrew: There will be incidents where the owners have those pieces for 30+ years and they just wanted to get rid of it, but there are many people our age who would kill for that piece. Bridging the gap or in a way, forming that connection between old furniture that had run its course and new owners who are ready to start their life with it is really cool and is what drives us to keep doing it.

**Are you two Dallas locals? I would assume there are so many opportunities across the states for the industries you two are in, but what made you decided to stay and set up shop in Dallas?**

**Tevah:** Yes, we are both from the suburbs of Dallas. I grew up in Richardson and Andrew grew up in Frisco.
**Andrew:** Well, we both grew up in the suburbs of Dallas and always dreamt about what it would be like living downtown.
We’ve always wondered about living that downtown life but never got around to doing so until we got married. We both left town for school and ended up coming back here as grownups, which felt really different being in the city as adults.
We both really love the city, like obviously we wouldn’t mind moving somewhere else in the future, but we don’t plan on leaving anytime soon. Dallas is constantly growing in business and culture and we want to see what our part can be like in it.
**(continue below)**

It can be easy to think that you are trapped in a bubble because the city is so big and there are so many areas scattered around town, but that also makes it interesting i.e. you can feel like you’re in an entirely different place with just a 20 min drive outside of your circle! Everything’s got its own vibe and culture and if you are willing to venture out, Dallas defiantly will surprise you in ways you can never imagine.

Tevah: A huge reason we are both drawn towards downtown is the walkability. Building relationships with stores, coffee shops, and people in the area by walking around the city is what we really loved. We also have a huge group of friends that are spread out all over the DFW metroplex, and I think not just building relationships but also sourcing from all these areas is what really opened our eyes to just how big and amazing Dallas is. There will always be new people or pieces popping up from areas you’d never imagine yourself going but once you’re there, the experience is always unique and interesting.

How do you usually get your inspiration from? Are there any specific routines or things you do to get inspired?

Andrew: We should talk about the honeymoon then! Right after we got married we stayed at this hotel in Santa Monica, it’s called the Proper Hotel. I think that was my first exposure to hmm, how would you describe it?

Tevah: It was stunningly curated vintage. The whole thing was very well designed, it was modern, now, and it just so happened to be a project by renowned interior designer Kelly Wearstler. We stumbled upon this hotel and came in thinking since we are in the midst of the pandemic, we might as well find somewhere we can really enjoy cause I don’t think we can even leave the hotel. We had no idea it was one of those super beautiful influencer-loving spots!

Andrew: It was so well curated with vintage pieces spread around the space and merged into one cohesive image. The look was so unique to the point it felt like a museum and that experience was a glimpse into the genre for us and we both connected with that. We left our honeymoon with the idea that we need to build our life and style from what we took away from that trip, not to copy but interpret that in our own vision.

Tevah: Another big source of our inspiration is art museums. We actually got engaged at the Nasher Sculpture Garden and that is how our relationship and inspiration were wrapped around in, quality time and immersing ourselves in art.

I think Sostenuto is also a big way of us saying “Let’s build something that isn’t traditional art”. For Andrew and I, after we got married our inspiration sources sort of went onto a new chapter by finding mutual inspirations and love of art. In a way, we share a similar viewpoint and taste but with such individual takeaway from what we consumed. It’s like a whole new dimension within layers of who I am, who is Andrew, and who we are as a joint force.

*Because how boring would that be if we all have the same point of view?

Obviously, last year was collectively hard on everyone, while being stuck in your gorgeous place together, how did you do it? For example, I picked up cooking like everyone else to recenter myself but what got you two through it?

Andrew: It was a really interesting time for us because we got engaged for two months and then everything shuts down. Let me tell you planning a wedding in the middle of a pandemic was truly an interesting experience. We quickly realized that we need to try and control what we can but let go of things we can’t. We both expected our wedding to be one way and it wasn’t, or even how we picture the beginning of our marriage life. Like most couples who were quarantined together, we had comfort in the idea of at least we had each other to get through this hardship, then a month into our marriage we got a puppy. Having a quarantine puppy was a busy and fun experience which I think distracted us a little bit from the limitation the pandemic has brought.

Tevah: It was a rare opportunity for me because of the industry I worked in so during that time I was working a lot less. Andrew was still working from home back then and I wasn’t working as much so we got to spend more time together. I clearly remember in the midst of a stressful moment planning the wedding I literally said out loud “This is the first creative project together we’ve ever done!!”

So as I was thinking about the questions, our wedding actually means a lot more to us than we thought. It was really intentional in the design, the creative process, and dow to every detail there was. The whole thing took up a lot of our time and energy which was what got us through the majority of the shutdown, and now that I think of it I believe it is a sign for our future, you know, working together and being so hands on with our projects.

You have no idea how big that sigh of relief we both let out after the wedding *laughs, and being able to come home to each other and our puppy after a long day was also a blessing throughout the whole situation.

Editor: Like a Giant High Five! How cool is that!

*Looks around* I’ve only been able to see your amazing place through snippets of your story but now I am finally here in person! Wow.. like just wow! Would you mind showing me your most prized possession or favorite corner in your place?

Andrew: There are two things and I think we are on the same page with this. So, first thing, there is an authentic Eames lounge chair from the late 70s that we bought from another dealer. Finding a piece that we considered as a holy grail for the longest time in such a good condition was like a dream. That chair was really special to us not only because it was a really old piece in great condition, but we also got to support a fellow vintage furniture dealer in the process! This is one of those things that we know we WILL pass down to our kids, like, this is going into our will. *Chuckles

Tevah: Ok, so, the second thing, is where we are sitting right now, which is this table and these chairs. We both highly value hospitality and we’ve always felt that way in who we want to be and how we vision ourselves as a married couple. We want to be hospitable and generous, and this dining set is that idea materialized into. Each piece took a trip to Houston which makes up to 16 Hrs in total just to get them here, but the second we saw them together and sat down for a meal, we knew it was right. I remember that we’ve always joked about if by any unfortunate event we need to move and go right now what would you keep and my answer will always be this dining set. I can picture this being in our home when we were 90 and our grandkids will be sitting by this table, just like the Eames chair this is going into my will and this set really holds a great deal of emotional value for us.

Before I officially leave you two in peace (and scene), is there anything that’s exciting for you or on the horizon that you would like to share with the world?

Tevah: I feel like now would be the perfect moment to unveil some super big news but I think it all comes down to knowing that we will continue to work hard and things are only going to keep getting better.

Andrew: I’m excited about our collections this year, we found our groove and are ready to come back in full force after the holidays.