Though Egg Collective opened its wood shop in Brooklyn's Navy Yard in 2011, the of-the-moment design studio has been incubating for many years. Its three founders—Stephanie Beamer, Crystal Ellis, and Hillary Petrie—met when they were freshman undergraduate architecture students at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, and have been collaborating ever since. "Our friendship and our working relationship have always gone hand in hand," says Ellis.