Contractors model home in Long Valley shows his talents

WASHINGTON TWP. Long Valley resident Joseph Fernandez knows how to treat his customers and hes gotten a special award for his efforts.

Fernandez, owner of JMF Construction, LLC, has won the 2015 Customer Service award from Houzz, a website dedicated to remodeling and interior design professionals.

Fernandez has been using his skills on his own Jacki Drive home since 2006. He made plans for the house before he even closed on the deal. Plans included blowing out walls to dramatically redraft the floor plan, as well as building all the cabinetry and most of the furniture.

Not a lot of contractors work on their own house, though I dont know why, Fernandez said. I know some guys who have, and obviously, I do. If youve got the talent, why not enjoy it yourself?

Fernandez, 55, followed a less traditional path to starting his own business in 1986. He worked in the stagecraft end of theater in high school and while attending Emerson College in Massachusetts, where he later designed sets for his alma mater. He worked on productions as far as Tulsa, Okla. to Lake George for opera troupes and Broadway productions including helping with sets for Little Shop of Horrors and productions by the Julliard School in New York City. Eventually, he began working on construction, and said he found his passion for woodworking in custom furniture and cabinetry, mainstays to his remodeling business.

Ive done the Little Shop of Horrors in Manhattan, worked for Julliard, and run a lot of that stuff on my own, Fernandez said. I went into construction and moved up from custom cabinetry to overseeing a five story brownstone renovation project in the city.

Fernandez said he continued in construction when his employer went out of business. An architect he knew referred Fernandez remodel a home for a fellow theater worker.

From then on, I was in business, Fernandez said. I bought some tools and worked out of my fathers basement at first, then moved on to my own shop in Hillsboro, and eventually moved on to just running shop out of my home.

In almost a decade at Long Valley, his home has been a work in progress, though it has always served well as a display of his work that he cant help but tweak.

I moved here because I do a lot of work in Chester and Mendham, but I also stretch all the way from Peapack to Summit, as far as Jersey City. Theres a lot to do with upscale clients in Morris County and Essex, Fernandez said.

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Contractors model home in Long Valley shows his talents