Tyler McKay is an experienced builder and carpenter who has worked on a variety of commercial and art installation projects. Some of his most notable projects include transforming an 8,000 square foot gallery space into an immersive surrealist installation, designing and building two parallel escape rooms examining themes of privilege, and fabricating an underground 5,000 square foot surrealist installation within a concrete bunker. McKay aims to execute artist's visions through high quality woodwork, fabrication, and installation. He has expertise in designing and realizing complex spaces that push boundaries.

1. Tyler McKay
Builder Portfolio

2. Tyler McKay
Colony Sound
Privilege of Escape
A Cell in the Smile
Step Right Up
Commercial Works
Immersive Gallery Installation | Freeman + Lowe
Interactive Escape Room | Risa Puno + Creative Time
Underground Surrealist Installation | Freeman + Lowe
The complete transformation from gallery to fever dream
Marlborough Gallery London
p. 3
An examination of privilege through a pop-up escape room
Onassis Cultural Center NYC
p. 14
Fictional universe realized underground in concrete bunker
Private collection Cleveland Ohio
p. 18
Mixed Media Exhibition | Andrea Crespo
Retro-futuristic examination of identity in modern media
Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler Gallery Berlin
p. 30
Recent projects that inspire and engage
A range of several distinct commercial spaces
All over NYC
p. 34
I am a builder.
I am the beneficiary of generations of experience,
being the fortunate son of a long standing hereditary
carpentry obsession, and have garnered 20 years
of my own in the craft.
I have thrived across a myriad of sub-specialties and
find myself at a point in my career that challenging,
multi-disciplinary projects have
become my gold standard.
I would rather my work speaks for itself, so I hope this
collection of my proudest moments finds you well.

3. Colony Sound
A complete wall to wall reimagining of Marlborough’s
8,000+ sq ft. gallery space through the eclectic lens of
contemporary artists Freeman + Lowe
Lead Installer | Carpenter | Woodworker
Freeman + Lowe
Marlborough Gallery
London, UK

4. A surrealist immersive installa-
tion realizing the artists’ vision
of the fictional timeline of
SanSan, this exhibit presented
challenges on every front.
The 8,000+ sq. ft. white wall
gallery space was entirely
transformed; every surface
reconfigured into the textural,
frenetic tapestry the artists
had woven.
Remotely fabricated in NYC
for the exhibit in London, the
piece demanded forward
thinking and adaptation to
execute in the confines of the
artists’ vision, distinct layout
challenges and adherence to
local building code, all within a
deadline to completion for the
London Frieze Art Fair.
The exhibit consisted of a
dozen rooms, built and de-
fined within the confines of the
pristine white gallery space
of Marlborough Contempo-
rary. The transformation to
the carnivalesque texture and
color envisioned by the Artists’
represented anything but a
measured approach.
The range of finishes array
from stringent medical plas-
tique, to backlit LED sign-
boards to hand drawn plaster
stalactites to an entire room,
floor to ceiling, surfaced with
laminated copper, and just
about everything in between.
The challenges presented
by such a wide ensemble of
unique finishes spread across
a short install window required
a broad understanding of un-
orthodox materials to execute
the 5 week timeline of install.

6. Cobra Lounge
The crown jewel of the exhibit, representing more than 60% of the total budget of the
exhibit itself, The Lounge stood a considerable challenge in it’s realization. This was a fo-
cal point for my expertise in the project, as the room not only required precise bespoke
woodwork using reclaimed materials, but also several structural considerations.
The pieces displayed were constructed with concrete and ceramics rendering them in
the range of 350 to 500 lbs. each. The mirrored ‘crown’ in the ceiling recess required
specific attention to be structurally supported whilst retaining its precise shape with zero
tolerance for flex in the steel webbing. These constraints, combined with the inherent
limitations of building an entire room tight to the confines of the existing gallery space
left very little room for error and layout was paramount to assemble the specific vision
the artists maintained and achieving a soundly erected public space that conformed to
the numerous British building and safety codes.
A personal achievement for juggling a multitude of requirements. Before and after,
above and below

8. The Privilege of Escape
A clandestine laboratory, a dozen puzzles and two
parallel escape rooms examining themes
of privilege through play
Lead Fabricator | Installer
Risa Puno + Creative Time
Onaassis Cultural Center
New York NY

9. An escape room designed
to confront the concept of
socio-economic advantages
in the form of play, this space
was developed by Risa Puno in
association with Creative Time
as part of an initiatitive to
spark social discussion.
The space consists of two
identical spaces, housing in-
creasingly challenging games,
and differentiated by senso-
ry handicaps unique to each
space in the form of lighting
and audio, starkly highlighting
the conditions in which a team
could succeed.
The nature of this project
required a range of fabrica-
tion techniques. Among obvi-
ous structural requirements
to meet the aesthetic of the
artist, there were numerous
tech components (RFID, Mag-
netic sensors, arduino logic
processors etc.) that had to
be incorporated and realized
within the design and execu-
tion process.
All of these considerations
aside, the space and all ob-
jects had to adhere to guide-
lines for public participation,
which in itself present a chal-
lenge to safety, usability and
durability.

10. A Cell In The Smile
An immersive experiential installation piece bringing to
life the eccentric universe of SanSan International inside
a concrete bunker set deep underground
Lead Fabricator | Woodworker | Installer
Freeman + Lowe
Private Collection
Cleveland OH

11. A piece like no other, this
5,000+ sq ft space was realized
in an underground concrete
‘bunker’ constructed from an
industrial underpass tube. The
exhibit exists 40’ underground
and is entirely composed of
the imagined secret spaces of
SanSan, the fictional world of
artists Freeman + Lowe.
3 years in the making, I oper-
ated as chief woodworker and
carpenter, engineering the solu-
tions to fabricate this esoteric
space. I lead production on the
simulated museum space, while
managing a number of roles
throughout the 10+ individual
spaces to realize the ambitions
of our client artists.
Beyond just the specific wood-
working of our Natural History
section, an area for which I was
solely responsible, I was inte-
gral to developing every indi-
vidual space within the exhibit.
Fabricating seamless modular
rooms for export as compo-
nents, the practical application
of numerous finishes, structural
considerations and delicate in-
stalls, I played a hands-on part
in almost every aspect of the
project’s development.
An area of note beyond the
required vision-to-reality role I
played in this project, involved
digital design realizing itself in
the form of many objects and
areas in the final piece, includ-
ing the custom oak-framed
translucent ceiling piece, en-
tirely designed and created by
myself in the final room of the
installation, as glimpsed in the
next spread.

13. From the beginning, my role guiding the development of the simulated
natural history museum was critical. The space was manifested with
the design ideals of our own Natural History museum here in New
York and many cues were taken therein. There was of course a specific
aesthetic goal to achieve, but there were also numerous structural and
logistics considerations to be made. The entire space displayed was
designed and built in NYC to be shipped and installed on site in Ohio,
making the entire project a bit of a ship-in-a-bottle project. This entire
room of intricate woodwork was designed, dry-installed and then flat-
packed to be reassembled by myself on-site more than a year later.
The obvious challenges of producing work of this quality, specified to
last the test of time was one element, but fabricating the components to
be shipped and assembled on-site represented another challenge entire-
ly. Never have I had to make so many considerations for transporting a
piece, but the result speak for itself.

15. Step Right Up
A carnivalesque exploration of identity in the modern
world capturing the strangeness of new media
wrapped in a facade of tradition
Lead Fabricator
Andrea Crespo
Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler Gallery
Berlin Germany
An exhibition that demanded
precision, the juxtaposition of
traditional aesthetics against a
thoughtful assembly of mod-
ern ‘meme’ art brings identity
to the foreground.
This project required a precise
ability to bring the digital vi-
sions of the artist to light. The
images were canvas printed,
the frames were CNC cut in-
house and suspended with tra-
ditional textile techniques and
the hardware to seamlessly
affix them to the gallery walls
were developed and produced
in-house. The specific require-
ments of this project spanned
over aesthetic and pragmatic
and my ability to bring the dig-
ital to life was integral to the
success of the exhibit.

17. Commercial Work
A brief collection of recent noteworthy
commercial projects completed
Various Roles
multiple locations
New York NY
Sey Coffee
18 Grattan St,
Brooklyn NY
Renovation + Remodel + Refinish
Bespoke Maple Feature Seating
Bespoke Maple Furniture + Bar
Infrastructure for Maintenance of Commercial Roaster

18. Juku
32 Mulberry St
New York NY
Renovation + Remodel + Refinish
Bespoke Reclaimed Oak Interior
Ceiling Design + Fabrication + Installation
Violet
511 E. Fifth St.
New York NY
Renovation + Remodel + Refinish
Bespoke Oak seating + Millwork
Custom Arched Ceiling w Recessed Lighting

19. Tyler McKay
Manu Fortis Fabrications
610 Smith St. Brooklyn, NY
tyler@manufort.is
551-666-0971