“I had one of those ‘there’s got to be something better than this’ moments,” he says in a small showroom above his North Scottsdale office, exotic doors propped against every surface. “We had both worked our butts off for so long and wanted to get out of the city.”
The two fled London for a farmhouse in a town near Barcelona, Spain. They knew they wanted to be near the sea, in the country, around laid-back people. They soon found out  they had landed in a town known all over Europe for making doors and restoring antiques. French, Italian and English antique dealers made special trips to Spain just to visit the artisans who worked there.
Shanahan, who, like his mother, had an eye for furniture and décor, started hanging out in the workshops and meeting the local talent (one in particular, Jussep, would later become a business partner). Those encounters inspired him to travel around Spain for two years, seeking out the best craftsmen in the country.
“I would go to the cafés in the industrial areas, talk to the old guy at the counter and ask, ‘Is anyone doing anything cool with furniture or metalwork?’” he says. “That led to meeting interesting people.”