Tyler & Sash: Perfectly Tailored

In a retail world that’s increasingly moving toward a mass-market strategy, Tyler & Sash, custom window treatments and interior design studio in Winchester, Massachusetts, is succeeding with a business model that’s anything but.

From the staff of design experts who lead each client through the selection process, to design meetings in clients’ homes, to the array of custom services the team tailors to each client’s needs, Tyler & Sash aims to add a personal touch at every turn.

“A lot of companies in this industry operate as order-takers,” says Shaun Tyler Burgess, owner of Tyler & Sash. “We see it as our job to guide our customers from inspiration to installation. Everyone on our team has design and art backgrounds and is very customer-service focused. We do our due diligence and make sure we get it right.”

That “due diligence” most often starts with a meeting in a client’s home—a courtesy offered no matter the size of the job (or budget) a client comes in with. “It’s very personal,” says Tyler & Sash’s lead interior designer, Josh Bogart. “When stepping into someone’s home there are so many elements to take note of, so we ask a lot of questions, take a lot of photos, and toss a few ideas around on site. From there, we come back to the showroom and start pulling what speaks to us and share that with the client to narrow down to the perfect selection.”

While these in-home meetings are both a measure of customer service and an all-important step in getting each project just so, they’ve also yielded an unintended, but welcome, consequence for the business: Tyler & Sash has an ever-increasing number of requests for broader design and renovation services.

“When we’re with our clients in their homes, they’ll ask what we think about this or that. This leads us into a broader conversation about their space, and many clients learn quickly that it’s a lot easier to work with an expert,” says Bogart. “It is all about building trust and helping clients find confidence in their decisions. More often lately, we’ve been finding ourselves deep into a full house renovation, recalling the original request for a window treatments.”

Still, Tyler & Sash has no plans in the near future to shift its primary focus toward full-scale design. “The core of our business is window treatments, finishes, and wallpaper,” says Burgess. A safe bet, given the hard-to-rival breadth of the studio’s fabric collection, which pairs a mix of tried-and-true standards like Schumacher, Duralee, Cowtan & Tout, Rogers & Goffigon, and Colfax & Fowler with specialty lines like Zak & Fox, Lance Wovens (stunning handwoven leather) and Massachusetts-based Ellisha Alexina and Peter Fasano, to name a few.

Tyler & Sash has developed such a devoted customer base that a second studio opened in Wellesley this winter. “Folks from all over Boston are finding our Winchester location, and we have a number of clients throughout Newton, Brookline, and Wellesley. So when the space became available we jumped on it,” says Burgess. “We bring the same curated selection of fabric, wallpaper, and window treatments to the new studio and have a designer on hand full-time to provide expert guidance.” In other words, just the kind of experience that makes the second location every bit as successful as the first.

Tyler & Sash Wellesley
540 Washington St, Wellesley, MA
880 Main St, Winchester, MA