Photo courtesy of Moses Restorations.
Matt and Jennifer Moses of Moses Restorations
Matt and Jennifer Moses run Moses Restorations, a full-time furniture refinishing business the couple launched after teaching themselves the craft a decade ago on a tight budget.
In a modest garage workshop that wakes up before sunrise, Matt and Jennifer Moses spend their days breathing new life into tired dining tables and heirloom dressers, delicately reshaping the way people think about furniture and home.
What began as a budget workaround for their daughter Caroline’s “big girl” bedroom a decade ago has become a full-time restoration business called Moses Restorations — and a window into the deep emotional ties people have with the pieces that fill their rooms.
“We have expensive taste on a low budget,” Jennifer said with a laugh. “When we wanted a Pottery Barn set, we didn’t have the Pottery Barn money.”
So they turned to the internet and, for the first time in their lives, became unexpected do-it-yourselfers.
As prices for new furniture climb and some mass-produced pieces wear out faster than expected, more homeowners are looking at what they already own and asking if it can be saved instead of replaced.
What once seemed like a niche, old-fashioned craft has become a practical, even trendy choice for people who want durability, character and a smaller environmental footprint — all while keeping the stories embedded in their furniture.
For Matt, the work is as much about people as it is about wood. He lit up while describing the moment customers return for pickups.
“Just seeing people’s faces when they come back and see you have restored it from its old life, bringing back the new life to it — that’s what I like,” he said.
Local homeowners these days are gravitating back to “classic” fully stained pieces, enlisting help to rid quality pieces of overly yellow, orange or red color tones.
“People want to keep the furniture in the family, but also marry it with the look that [they] want,” Jennifer said. “They just don’t make [new pieces] how they did in the past.”
The couple had no idea they’d end up as professional furniture restoration specialists, with Jennifer becoming more of the creative artist and Matt establishing himself as the precise craftsman.
When COVID shut down Matt’s personal training work and kept everyone home, the side gig they’d been running for three years suddenly surged.
“We really boomed during that time,” said Jennifer, who still works as an emergency room nurse at Children’s of Alabama. “We took it as a godsend when we saw how busy the furniture business was going. We said, ‘Let’s do this full time and trust the Lord to provide.’”
With no formal training behind them, they relied on each project and a tight online network of refinishers, trading tips and techniques in a near-constant back‑and‑forth that quickly made them sought-after experts.
But behind each smooth, revitalized tabletop lies hours of unseen labor: stripping, sanding, wrestling with veneers and mismatched leaves, and correcting failed DIY attempts.
“We feel like we get to be a part of people’s family dinner conversations and we get to be part of people’s families,” Jennifer said. “We know that you’re trusting us with valuable furniture. We don’t take that lightly.”
For more, visit mosesrestorations.com.
