On “The Brady Bunch,” the patriarch, Mike Brady, earned a living as an architect. His TV son, Peter Brady, played by Christopher Knight, has taken a nod from the show.

Knight co-founded Christopher Knight Designs, whose mission is to develop furniture suited for online retail. The pieces are available at christopherknightbrands.com, as well as Amazon, Target and Overstock.

Knight will discuss his line as well as his TV career on Friday, March 27, and Saturday, March 28, at the Southern AZ Home Show at the Tucson Convention Center. 

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“It’s very much not a presentation from the home improvement / builder perspective,” Knight said via Zoom.

“It’s really a retrospective. We use the ‘Brady experience’ then to launch into the whole thing about what ‘Brady’ is. ‘Brady’ is not necessarily directly attached to building, but the ‘Brady’ home itself is representative of home.”

Christoper Knight Home offers indoor and outdoor furniture — seating, tables, storage pieces and décor. Designs incorporate contemporary and midcentury‑influenced silhouettes, with an emphasis on materials that support mass production and broad consumer appeal. 

Outdoor furniture is Christopher Knight Home’s bread and butter, while indoor pieces are ideal for living rooms, bedrooms, and office segments. Christopher Knight Designs works with overseas manufacturers to produce its collections releases new collections annually, addressing changes within the seasons.

“The furniture world goes through these great booms,” he said. “We’re very fortunate to be in a position to survivor in the online space, which is energic and growing.”

Bringing talent to the table

Knight left the entertainment industry to focus on high-tech. After 25 as an executive in the computer industry, Knight returned to entertainment. 

He unexpectedly entered the furniture business. When he was in his late 20s, early 30s, Knight sought a career path that he “could trust.” He worked in high tech with friends, one of whom left the industry and segued into furniture.

He created Christopher Knight Home — and the response was overwhelming, he said. Knight was comfortable in the furniture industry.

“I realized that I had nothing but that industry around me,” Knight explained. “Growing up, my mom was an artist.

“My mom’s family was in the fabric industry back in New York City. My father made all our furniture. My father, interestingly, was studying to be an architect when he discovered theater and the arts, which is the opposite of Mike Brady or Robert Reed, and he made all of our furniture. 

“His father was a craftsman. He was a shoemaker in the fashion industry. I had a lot of that in me, I supposed. I built and remodeled a few homes. So, the furniture [move] was rather obvious to me once I was in it. I just wasn’t obvious. Now I’m synonymous with that is a very trusted brand in its in its own right, because I’m literally a member of everyone family.”

Thanks to his Peter Brady character, the furniture is selling well.

 “I’m trusted like that.,” Knight said.

“I’m invited on the inner circle of families before I’ve even known an individual’s name. That’s important in the world of online selling. Everything at that point was non branded, and having something that had a known quantity to it was, turned out to be very important and led to our success and continues to this day. But that means I have to respect that I’m trusted to not then allow anything to damage that trust.”

Knight said the products, which are made in overseas, are not meant to be “heirloom pieces.” Christopher Knight Home caters to apartment residents, or those in the market for easy-to-assemble, sturdy furniture.  

“A lot of our customers are space-challenged customers, people living in apartments,” Knight said. “The scale of the furniture must be appropriate for that environment, for the balconies that exist for that outdoor furniture. We have a range of sizes that will fit that marketplace.”

The furniture styles and lines are changed seasonally to give consumers the option to redesign their indoor or outdoor spaces. Purchasing new furniture summer and winter can be expensive, but it’s possible.

“They can contemplate this because our furniture is delivered at a reasonable price,” he said. “They haven’t invested so heavily. It’s a whole different mentality. This allows them to evolve their interior spaces, instead of being stuck with what they have.” 

Other projects

In the last 20 years, Knight has appeared on the likes of Fox’s “That ’70s Show” and “The Masked Singer,” WB’s “Blue Collar TV,” and Peacock’s “Dragging the Classics.” 

In 2019, Knight and his “Brady” siblings appeared on HGTV’s “A Very Brady Renovation.” During the reality TV show, they renovated the interior of “The Brady Bunch” house in Studio City. 

“None of us knew where the house was. We never worked at it, interesting. We never showed any curiosity toward that,” he said. 

“We did the show for five seasons, from ’69 to ’74. There were who could have identified for us where that house was. Like Sherwood [Schwartz, creator]. I finally asked Lloyd, his son, in the ’90s.”

Knight recently teamed up with his “Brady” brother Barry Williams for “The Real Brady Bros.” Podcast, a weekly episodic recap and retrospective dialog on their classic episodes. 

Now 55, he went to the other side of the camera in 2019, when he and his longtime friend Phil Viardo, formerly of Prodigy Media, produced “Truelove: The Film,” a documentary about the rare genetic disorder Williams Syndrome. 

“The making of ‘Truelove: The Film’ was an immensely rewarding experience,” he said.

“The impact this made in the lives of those in WS, and know it stands to make a difference long into the future, is deeply gratifying.” 

His heart still fondly remembers “The Tiki Bar” episode in Hawaii, which featured Vincent Price as Professor Hubert Whitehead. In it, a tarantula climbs on Peter — and the scene was more complex that it looked.

“There’s a person who comes to the set with an animal called a wrangler,” she said. “In this case, it’s a spider wrangler. I couldn’t believe somebody trains a spider; like a spider is expected to work on cue. 

“By blowing air at the spider, it will move the opposite direction of the air coming out of that straw. They had to put the bed on blocks so the spider wrangler can crawl on the floor around the bed.”

The team told the 13-year-old Knight that it put ball bearings on the arachnid’s fangs so it couldn’t inject poisons. 

“It gave me a false sense of courage,” he said with a laugh.

“Here’s this thing crawling up and the look on my face of terror was real. That wasn’t acting. It was very close to my mouth.”

Williams scooped up the tarantula when it was getting too close. He was safe.

“Years later, I was at the [Field Museum in Chicago] and there was an arachnid exhibit. They recognized me, I told the spider story about the ball bearings and the scientists just laughed. They said it wasn’t possible. They lied to me. “

Information: Christopher Knight will appear at the Southern AZ Home Show at 1 p.m. Friday, March 27, and Saturday, March 28, at the Tucson Convention Center, 260 S. Church Avenue, Tucson. Tickets start at $8; those 65 and older are admitted free on Friday, March 27. For more information, visit southernazhomeshow.com