Rago Auctions

Master woodworker Andrew Franz was born in 1936 in Batchka Palanka, a part of the old Austria Hungarian Empire. A displaced person, he made his way into Austria in 1948 where he trained as a journeyman cabinetmaker in the city of Graz from 1952 to 1956, when he boarded a Liberty cargo ship bound for Trenton, New Jersey. Franz found his way to the George Nakashima Studio in New Hope, Pennsylvania in 1957. Nakashima's design approach and reverence for craftsmanship engaged him and he accepted an offer of employment and remained with the studio as an associate for eleven years, woodworking, furniture-making, and installing large-scale projects. Retired since 1998, Franz has not lost his love of wood or his desire to make beautiful, utile things. He continues to craft in a style influenced—but not defined—by Nakashima, using found and stored wood sourced in Hopewell Township, New Jersey and Hope Town, Bahamas.