The Irony, a custom metal fabrication shop in East Hampton, is a quintessential mom-and-pop operation in the best sense of the phrase.
Owned and operated for over three decades by Robert and Elizabeth Linker (aka, Bob and Liz), the place has come to be known as much for its stellar craftsmanship as for its clever name.
The Irony specializes in handmade metal railings of all sizes and types. Railing fabrication represents the lion’s share of the company’s business, but the shop also creates beautiful and unique lighting fixtures, furniture, gates and awnings, even the occasional weathervane or metal sculpture. More info is available online.
Liz, who originally founded the shop, deals with the business end of things. Bob, an artisan down to his bones, personally bends and shapes and otherwise manipulates copper, bronze, brass, aluminum, stainless steel and other metals to the standards of an exacting clientele – mostly homeowners, designers and architects living and working between Montauk and Southampton Village.
While the couple occasionally accepts jobs a bit further afield – they might venture all the way out to the hinterlands of say, Quogue or Westhampton – Bob prefers to do his thing relatively close to his East Hampton shop.
Luckily for the Linkers, there’s a seemingly inexhaustible supply of construction and renovation work available on their swath of the South Fork. Upscale homeowners in the area are always looking for the perfect handmade brass railing to complement the masonry on their reimagined front porch, for example – or a flawless stainless steel bannister that snakes in an inviting geometric arc up their new spiral staircase.
Before the couple were married and before Bob became The Irony’s resident master craftsman, Liz established the first incarnation of the shop in Water Mill in 1991.
“It just sort of evolved over 10 years of collecting furniture,” she explains. “I had this big old 5,000-square-foot potato barn on Deerfield Road, and my sister and I would collect pieces and restore them. But it was more of a side hustle, almost a hobby.”
A few years earlier, Liz had founded Hedges & Gardens, a full-service landscaping business she still owns and operates today.
During that period, Bob was working as a vintage race car restorer and mechanic.
“We would typically hit one race a season,” he remembers. “I would drive a truck with three cars in it to events up and down the East Coast. They’d. race the cars and then I’d spend half the night fixing them.”
Of all the race cars that found their way into Bob’s shop over the years, one of his favorites was a 1959 Porsche 718 RSK that was ultimately owned by the designer Ralph Lauren.
While it’s been many years since Bob made his living working on vintage cars, he still spends plenty of time in the world of motor vehicles.
“My automotive interest will never go away,” he says. “I keep a little private garage across the street. Right now, my son has an ‘87 Corvette in there that we’re putting a clutch and some other stuff in – and I’m dying to finish it because my truck needs work.”
Bob also spends a good chunk of his leisure time maintaining the couple’s 45-foot sailboat. Over the years, Bob and Liz have spent more time living on the water than on land. And between 1993 and 1997, they lived on their boat year-round.
Given his background in boating, auto mechanics and metalwork of all kinds, Bob was a natural fit for the type of business The Irony would eventually become.
In 1991, after a first date where the couple painted the walls of the recently opened shop, Bob and Liz’s future as both romantic partners and business partners began to take shape.
Liz was asked by a local designer to create a 10-foot-tall aluminum and steel weathervane for the well known interior decorator Robert Metzger.
“I said to Bob, ‘this is quite an opportunity,’” Liz recalls. “‘Would you be interested in fabricating it with me and we’ll work out the money later?’” Bob accepted – and the project ended up being a full-on collaboration rather than a simple fabrication.
The original design for the weathervane turned out to be more of an idea than a fully realized plan.
“I don’t know how much of a design he had when he came in,” Bob says of the client. “He had the concept and he had the opportunity, but he needed guidance.”
Hurdles aside, the weathervane project turned out well – as did Bob and Liz’s partnership. The couple have now been together for almost 35 years.
In 1996, Bob and Liz moved The Irony to its current location on Sag Harbor Turnpike in East Hampton.
While the shop is definitely a mom-and-pop operation, the Linkers have found ways to infuse it with new blood. About four years ago, they brought on Tommy Brunn, a young high school student (now a Senior) as an apprentice. With Bob as his mentor, Brunn has been learning his craft the old-school way.
“I just love how creative you can be,” Brunn says. “There are endless possibilities working with this stuff.”
“Tommy has what Bob has – it’s a God-given gift, ”Liz says, as she shows off one of the first welding projects Brunn, who was in 9th grade at the time, created under Bob’s watchful eye. “That’s a very strong, penetrative weld.”
Given that the Linkers’ son, Bryce – an entrepreneur in his own right – has interests that preclude him from taking over the shop, Brunn plans to take business courses in college next year with an eye toward potentially keeping The Irony going when Bob and Liz decide that it’s time to step away.
“I hope he’ll continue this,” Liz says a little wistfully. “I’m really hoping Tommy buys the company one day.” Brunn is not the only metalworker Bob Linker has trained.
Though he has 50 years or so on the young apprentice, Steven Schaffer has learned most of what he knows about his craft from Bob. Schaffer, who is now a close friend of the family, showed up at The Irony about five years ago. An investment banker by trade, Schaffer had always been interested in art. He had taken a welding class in Queens and had created a small-scale version of Linda Scott’s iconic “Stargazer” sculpture in Manorville. Standing approximately two feet high, Shaffer’s Stargazer lived in the pool area of his vacation home in East Hampton.
“I made it out of mild steel, which oxidizes and turns a beautiful crimson color,” he explains.
His guests were so intrigued by Shaffer’s reproduction of what is by far the most well known piece of sculpture on the East End that he decided to duplicate it and give it as a birthday gift to some of his friends.
“I walk into The Irony with this thing and I see Bob in the studio,” Shaffer remembers. “He’s got a big smile on his face and he says, ‘you want me to knock it off?’ And I say, ‘I’d like you to knock off a few of them.’”
After discussing the specifics of the project with Bob for a while, Shaffer had an epiphany. Covid was in its early stages at the time and Shaffer suggested that he rent time at the shop where he could work on the reproductions himself under Bob’s tutelage.
Bob agreed, transforming Shaffer into something of an unlikely apprentice in the process. A couple of years later, with plenty of guidance from Bob, Shaffer created what is in essence a professional metal shop in his East End home.
Shaffer describes Bob as “the most talented and creative guy I’ve ever met in the art world,” adding, “I have never had an idea for making something that he couldn’t figure out how to do.”
That sentiment is seconded by Bob’s wife.
“Bob is still blowing my mind,” Liz says. “He still blows everyone’s mind.”
This article appears as the cover story for the Columbus Day weekend edition of Behind The Hedges in Dan’s Papers. Tap this link to read the full digital version. For more Master Craftsman columns, click here.
pattern.Robert Linker
