Features & Essays

Beyond Market: Building a City of Art and Design

The founder of a North Carolina creative workforce development nonprofit shares how craft and design can buoy prospects for cities and artists alike.

By Michael Manes
July 24, 2026

Digital Only

Craft industry

Free To Read

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Potter Bill Jones works out of a studio space in Cohab Space's massive campus in High Point, North Carolina.

The first time my wife Hanna and I came to High Point, North Carolina, in the fall of 2022, we thought we were coming for High Point Market. We had no idea we were beginning a new chapter of our lives.

At the time, we were exhibiting and selling artwork through Blue Spiral 1 in Asheville, where I had spent more than 15 years as gallery director. We had come for High Point Market, the world’s largest home-furnishings trade show. Since 1909, it has brought designers, retailers, manufacturers, architects, and media from around the world to High Point every spring and fall, generating billions of dollars in economic activity and reinforcing the city’s identity as the home-furnishings capital of the industry.

At the time, we were not thinking about starting a nonprofit, developing a creative campus, or spending a significant portion of our lives in a former hosiery mill.

But the more time we spent in High Point, a city of 114,000 in North Carolina’s Piedmont Triad, the more we looked beyond the showrooms and trade events. We saw a city built around making some of the most exquisite handmade furniture and upholstery. We saw generations of craftsmanship, manufacturing expertise, entrepreneurship, and design. We saw historic mills and mill villages that told the story of how this region developed. Most importantly, we saw possibility.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Michael Manes (far right), who founded Cohab Space with his wife Hanna Manes, speaks on a panel at High Point Market.

Our backgrounds naturally led me and Hanna to ask different questions. My career has been spent working alongside artists, curating exhibitions and helping creative entrepreneurs build their businesses. Hanna grew up surrounded by artists and makers and later built a career in interior design, developing a deep appreciation for craftsmanship, thoughtful design, and the way creative work shapes how we experience the world.

Looking at High Point through those combined perspectives, it was hard not to imagine what could happen here. What would it look like if artists and designers became a more visible part of High Point’s future? What would happen if some of the creative energy that converges in the city during Market had more opportunities to take root throughout the rest of the year?

Over the next two years, those conversations grew into something much larger. We met John Muldoon, who had purchased the historic Melrose Hosiery Mill in 2017 with a vision of creating a year-round destination for art, design, and community. John said he knew he could not realize that vision alone. We shared his belief that High Point had the potential to become much more than a city people visit twice a year for Market.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Cohab Space took over the 80,000-square-foot Melrose Hosiery Mill campus in High Point. Sixty-five percent of the campus has yet to be activated; the other 35 percent is full of studios, galleries, event spaces, and workshops.

“We believe artists, makers, and designers are small businesses. They create jobs, activate buildings, attract investment, and contribute to the identity of a place.”

— Michael Manes

In 2025, we founded Cohab Space to steward the 80,000-square-foot campus through programming, artist support, and workforce development. Later that year, the campus had welcomed its first studio artists and opened its doors for exhibitions, workshops, performances, and public programming.

We often describe Cohab Space as a creative workforce nonprofit. What that means is simple: We believe artists, makers, and designers are small businesses. They create jobs, activate buildings, attract investment, and contribute to the identity of a place. They preserve craft traditions, inspire innovation, and strengthen the communities where they live and work. Yet many creative people are expected to navigate their careers with far fewer support systems than other entrepreneurs.

We believe they deserve the same investment, mentorship, infrastructure, and long-term support that we readily provide to other industries. When creative people succeed, communities benefit. That belief is the foundation of everything we are building at Cohab.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Quilts by artist Luke Haynes decorate the exterior spaces at Cohab Space.

Today, Cohab occupies the historic Melrose Hosiery Mill, where artist studios, workshops, creative businesses, exhibitions, performances, and community gathering spaces exist side by side. Nearly 65 percent of the property has yet to be activated. We have a long term vision for the campus, but we are also building the plane while flying it. Every exhibition, partnership, workshop, tenant, and event teaches us something new about what this place can become.

On any given day, an artist may be working in a studio while students tour the campus. A furniture prototype may be taking shape in one building while a musician prepares for an evening performance in another. A prospective tenant may be walking through an empty space imagining what it could become. Those moments matter—they create the overlap where new ideas, relationships, and opportunities emerge.

One of the best examples of this is artist and furniture maker Ellie Richards. I first met Ellie while she was a resident at Penland School of Craft and eventually began representing her work at Blue Spiral. As our relationship developed, we introduced her work to audiences beyond traditional gallery settings through High Point Market and Shoppe Object. During an early visit to Cohab, members of the Banana Republic design team were drawn to one of her bright red ladder sculptures. What began as a conversation about a work of art evolved into an entirely new opportunity for Ellie, who adapted the design into functional shelving for Banana Republic stores. Today versions of that original piece can be found in multiple flagship locations.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Conan Castillo, a metal artist, recently relocated his studio from Los Angeles to Cohab Space.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Ellie Richards's Red Towers, wood, 80 x 108 x 22 in.
Photo courtesy of Banana Republic for Cohab Space

Richards's work was adapted into this display for Banana Republic stores.

“I’ve never believed a piece has to choose between being looked at and being used, so when Cohab asked whether the tower could become functional for this specific retail setting, it wasn’t a compromise, just an opportunity to expand on the concept and form,” she says.

When creative people have access to opportunity, mentorship, meaningful work, and a community that believes in their potential, remarkable things happen. We’ve seen artists discover new audiences, students find career pathways, and partnerships emerge that none of us could have predicted.

As we look toward the future at Cohab Space, we find ourselves returning to the same question that first emerged when we began spending time in High Point: what does it truly mean to be a city of art and design?

The city already possesses extraordinary assets. It has a history of making, a deep manufacturing knowledge base, remarkable architecture, entrepreneurial energy, and a global design audience that visits twice each year. The opportunity now is to build on that foundation.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Cohab Space hosts concerts, gatherings, and events, such as this panel presented by High Point x Design.

To us, a city of art and design is not defined by the events it hosts, but by the opportunities it creates for the people who make, build, imagine, and contribute to it every day.

When we first came to High Point, we thought we were coming for Market. What convinced us to build here was everything beyond it: the people, the history, the mills, the culture of making, and the belief that this city has all the ingredients to become something truly special.

Cohab is one small part of that larger story, and in many ways, we are just getting started. More than half of our campus remains to be activated, which means there is still enormous room to experiment, collaborate, and imagine what comes next. That may be what excites us most.

If High Point is going to become a true city of art and design, it will not happen because of one organization. It will happen because artists, makers, designers, entrepreneurs, educators, and neighbors choose to build that future together.

We are grateful to be building alongside them.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

The massive campus includes gallery spaces.

Photo courtesy of Cohab Space

Cohab Space's spacious woodshop.

Michael Manes is the co-founder and co–executive director at Cohab Space in High Point, North Carolina.

Learn more about Cohab Space online.

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