Trident One

Project Overview

When the quickly expanding Manda Marie Upholstery–which designs, fabricates and restores automotive interiors and convertible tops—grew beyond its 3,000-square-foot facility, Fox Structures was able to provide a custom space that met the company’s needs.

“We were flat out of the room we needed to expand,” said Manda Beyer, owner. “We were hiring more people and offering more services, and we just didn’t have nearly enough space to accommodate what we needed.”

The business, now in its seventh year, eventually located the 16,000-foot space in the Trident One building in Neenah. Beyer met with Fox Structures designers and “as soon as we had a conversation, we were able to start designing the space with them, and it went so quickly,” Beyer said. “We got to be involved in every single aspect of it, making sure it was exactly what we needed for our business.”

One feature Beyer needed was an abundance of natural sunlight to allow the staff to clearly see and avoid flaws in the leather used to upholster vehicles. “I told them that as many windows as I can get away with, that’s how many I want,” Beyer said. “We plastered the whole building full of windows.”

That includes eight sets of five-by-six-foot windows as well as smaller windows above them. The Fox Structures team also installed more than one million lumens of LED light.

“We can have all of our lights off, and just with the windows, it’s still twice as bright in our building as it was in our last shop with all of the lights on,” Beyer said. “The natural bright space is nice in general, and it gives you a good feeling when you walk in the door. It’s a great, positive energy.”

The Fox Structures team completed the work on the building and Manda Marie Upholstery was able to move into its new space in the multi-tenant building in July 2023.

Project Features