08/19/2025
✨Featured Artist: Brandon Mittman✨
Brandon is a self-taught woodworker, Judaica artist, and the maker behind the one-of-a-kind mezuzah cases in our TBE Myra B. Danzing Judaica Gift Shop!
Brandon lives in Richmond with his wife, Dorit, and their two young children, Charlie and Jonah. When they moved here in 2021, it reignited his passion for both woodworking and Judaism. Since then, he’s created art and furniture of all sizes, including TBE’s Torah table, crafted from wood salvaged from the synagogue’s original sanctuary furniture.
Almost ten years ago, Brandon’s woodworking journey began when his grandfather gave him a small, cracked piece of stabilized wood burl. Too imperfect for furniture but with strikingly beautiful grain, it sat in his shop for years until Brandon turned it into mezuzah cases for his family. They loved them, and he’s been making mezuzahs ever since.
🌳 Brandon’s favorite woods are those with a story. He once crafted a table from the trunk of a friends childhood apple tree, its rings revealing 70 years of life, including scars from a fire. He often works with “useless lumber,” like burls with wild grain patterns or spalted wood, where natural fungi leave behind striking dark lines. Sometimes his work even includes rare treasures like Karelian Birch, the same wood once used in Fabergé eggs.
He sources much of his wood from small, local sawmills around Central Virginia and the Southern Appalachians, one of the most biodiverse non-tropical areas in the world. For Brandon, each mezuzah continues the life of the tree it came from, connecting the natural world to Jewish tradition.
“I hope people really feel them with their hands,” he says. “I use the most natural finishes possible, so when you touch one of my mezuzahs, you’re touching the wood itself, not a layer of wax or plastic.”
📍 You can purchase Brandon’s beautiful mezuzah cases at the TBE gift shop or online at his Etsy store: bsmwoodart.etsy.com
