the table is social infrastructure.TABLES brings people together to design and build their own dining tables, then carry them home and use them. Each table becomes a place for meals, conversation, and everyday life. We photograph those moments and share them across the city.
We start with a simple belief: the household is where everything begins. TABLES returns to the table as a place for connection, ritual, and shared life.
VISION
COHORT MODEL
Cohort — Households join a group and design a table.
Build — Tables are hand-built through a guided woodshop process.
Activate — Tables are delivered and used in the home.
Testify — Households are documented using their table at home and shared publicly.
TABLES Project begins in Chicago.
Cohorts form across neighborhoods, reflecting the city’s cultural and architectural diversity. The city becomes a civic horizon for testimony, circulation, and public encounter.
CHICAGO AS CIVIC GROUND
TESTIMONY
Every table is documented in use. These images witness the diverse daily rituals, relationships, and ordinary beauty of household life.
Testimony from each cohort circulates through exhibitions, publications, and city-scale installations.
ORIGINS
TABLES Project was founded in Chicago by artist and educator Nathan Miller. Drawing from woodworking, photography, and social design, the project brings households together through building, eating, conversation, and testimony.