VITRUWORKS
Precision-fabricated Metal Products
Made to order

Made for your space, your body, and the way you live.

A piece chosen from a catalog can maybe answer one of the three questions Vitruvius asked of anything worth building:

Is it built to last? Does it actually work for the person using it? Is it beautiful?

Ours are designed, engineered and fabricated to answer all three.

Our 3D Virtual Gallery A selection of our designs
we also build yours
Categories
Styles

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Plica Scriptoria Desk · Dining table
Turn, zoom and finish each piece · colors shown are examples
Three tests all our works must pass
Firmitas · Strong

Engineered, not just rendered

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Each piece is modeled down to its frames, bends and bolts before a price is quoted. 11 gauge steel, dimensioned sheets, and a tip-over check you can read.

See the engineering
Utilitas · Fits the person

Checked against your body

More

We build a posable mannequin to your measurements and seat it at the desk in 3D, so knee room, keyboard height and reach are settled before fabrication.

How the fit check works
Venustas · Beautiful

Beauty from a single gesture

More

A fold, a line, a finish. Each design is simple enough to build well, in swirled stainless, patinated copper or painted steel.

See the finishes

The collection

Four designs, five pieces. Sizes and finishes are made to order. This is where we start, not where we stop.

Obliqua desk, design render
Desk

Obliqua Scriptoria

A single folded plane reaches out from a Z-shaped base. Keyboard shelf and cable channel are built in.

Plica Scriptoria desk, design render
Desk · Dining table

Plica Scriptoria

Folded-sheet legs fan from a wide footprint to a narrow neck under a stainless, copper or painted top. A hidden tray holds the keyboard shelf and power.

Plica Mensula console with a single central pedestal, design render
Console

Plica Mensula

One central pedestal carries a floating top. The same fold as the desk, scaled to a console.

Lunata Scriptoria, design render
Desk · Painted steel

Lunata Scriptoria

A crescent top with a gently hollowed front edge, carried on two crescent supports. Painted steel only, tack-welded and finished to avoid distortion.

Lunata Mensula, design render
Console · Painted steel

Lunata Mensula

The same crescent top on a single central crescent support. Painted steel, in the colour you choose.

Not limited to this collection.

These are a few of the works that we have previously designed.
If you have a design of your own, a sketch, or only an idea, we will design, engineer, and build it.

Bring us your design
Fit check

See it fit before it is made.

Send your height, inseam and the chair you use. We build a posable mannequin to those dimensions and place it at the desk in the 3D viewer, so you can judge knee room, keyboard height and reach.

How the fit check works
  1. Send your measurements.
  2. Review your mannequin at the desk, from any angle.
  3. Adjust the top size or keyboard shelf before drawings are released.
5′2″ 5′9″ 6′0″ or your exact size
Transparent mannequin seated at the Plica Scriptoria desk in the 3D viewer
Side view in the 3D viewer · mannequin shown transparent
Engineering

Documented in full.

Every design has a drawing set an architect or fabricator can read: the structure, the fasteners and the bends, not only the surface.

See a sample drawing sheet
Drawing sheet FP-D-02: front elevation and sections of the Fan Pleat leg with dimensions
Sheet FP-D-02 · Leg assembly · Concept drawing

Each sheet set includes

  • Dimensioned views with hidden lines
  • Sections through the leg and the top
  • Exploded assembly and bill of materials
  • Gauges, bend radii and weights
  • Tip-over check
  • Finish chart

Downloads

PDF spec sheet STEP model DWG drawings
Files for architects to drop into their own plans.
Finishes

Metal only, finished by hand.

Bodies are painted steel. Tops come in swirled stainless, patinated copper or paint. Colors shown are examples, and every finish is fully customizable.

See the finishes
Swirled stainless steel finish

Swirled stainless

A soft, cloud-like swirl that hides fingerprints and catches light across the whole top.

Patinated copper finish

Patinated copper

Uncoated copper with a light brown patina over the whole surface, so handprints do not show. Copper cleaner strips it, and it can be re-patinated.

Powder-coated steel

Midnight, espresso, graphite, forest, oxblood, bone, or a color matched to your project.

Leonardo DaVinci, Vitruvian Man, c. 1490
Where the name comes from

Vitruvius. DaVinci.
Two visionaries, one idea.

Nearly 2,000 years ago, the Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius laid out three requirements for anything worth building: it should be firmitas, solid and structurally sound; utilitas, genuinely useful, built for how it’s actually used; and venustas, beautiful. Centuries later, Leonardo DaVinci gave those same ideas a face, drawing the human body itself as the standard of proportion in his Vitruvian Man.

We named this studio for that lineage on purpose. Every Vitru Works piece begins with those same three questions, and we answer them on paper, in the design, the engineering and the fit check, before any metal is cut.

Firmitas · Utilitas · Venustas
Solid. Useful. Beautiful.
Enquire

From first call to delivery.

  1. 1Choose a design and size. Desk, dining table or console, in the finish you want.
  2. 2Fit check. Review your mannequin at the desk and adjust.
  3. 3Drawings for approval. The full sheet set, signed off before cutting.
  4. 4Fabrication in the U.S. Lead time [LEAD TIME].
  5. 5Delivery and placement. [DELIVERY TERMS].

Tell us about your project

Tell us the room, the person and the finish. We reply with a fit check and a price from [PRICE].

We custom build anything in metal. Bathtubs, jacuzzi, pools, water features, and more.

Enquire →
[Contact email] · [Studio location]
Our story
Dale C. Murley
Founder

Dale C. Murley

Founder and chief designer at DaVinci Spas, with over four decades in custom design and manufacturing, engineering and building one-off pieces in stainless steel, copper and painted steel. Vitru Works applies that experience to furniture: each piece designed and engineered for your project, then built once, in metal, in the U.S.

Design & fabrication accolades
  • Copper hot tub with waterfall designed by Dale C. Murley, gold winner, Metal and/or Concrete Spas, 20202020 · PHTA International Awards of Excellence. Gold medal awarded to DaVinci Spas, for a copper hot tub with waterfall Dale designed.
  • Hammacher Schlemmer catalog cover, Early Spring Supplement 2015, featuring a wind-up car designed by Dale C. Murley2015 · Hammacher Schlemmer, Early Spring Supplement. A wind-up car designed and fabricated by Dale was chosen for the catalog cover and featured in their Manhattan store.
VITRU WORKS · Designed by Dale C. Murley All images are design renders.