Michael is a highly accomplished, motivated and passionate former chef of exclusive luxury hotels with the highest regard for quality and style in design.  As one would expect from his hospitality background, he is client and service driven first and foremost.  As an Interior Architect, Michael has the unique distinction of truly understanding the needs of the hotelier.  A lifelong student of hospitality, Michael has worked in and been around the finest hotels in the United States, Asia and around the world for many years.  But his style comes not only from these experiences, but also from his years of artful composition in culinary creations.  When cooking, Michael always focused on balance; the way a dish is delicately composed, gently coaxing the most out of each ingredient and introducing them to others, layering and transposing them as one would do in a piece of music.  You could call it a modern Zen approach to creation, and he always tries to keep this in mind when envisioning a space.  To Michael, life and creativity are parallel, both ever-changing and constantly evolving, asking us to re-invent ourselves again and again.  With proper balance, only then can a dish, a space or a person, become truly successful.

A self proclaimed "global nomad", Michael has worked and travelled throughout the world, from New York City to San Francisco, from Southeast Asia to the Middle East, and most points in between.  In 2003, after a life altering experience at Angkor Wat in Cambodia, Michael was blessed into Buddhism in a ceremony which included him being doused in nearly 100 liters of water.   Several years later, while trekking through the Himalayas in Bhutan, he realized he was nearing another change in his life, although he was unaware of what that change would be.  At the end of 2007, he left his culinary career behind and began his career in design.