Long before Averill became a brand, Mahjong represented something quieter and more personal: the warmth of people gathered around the same table.

For one member of Averill’s founding team, some of the earliest associations with Mahjong came from growing up in a Chinese family where mothers and grandmothers loved to play. The lasting memory was never simply about winning a hand. It was the conversation around the table, the closeness between generations, and the sense of community created when people made time to sit together.

Years later, after coming to California from China as an international student and building a busy professional life in Silicon Valley, that familiar game appeared in an unexpected form.

During Lunar New Year in 2024, after an intense period of work and too many weekends disappearing into phone screens, the team member attended a local American Mahjong club gathering. It was intended to be a simple way to unwind, step away from work, and reconnect with people in person.

Instead, it became a moment of discovery. The Mahjong remembered from childhood had crossed cultures and developed a distinctly American language: different rules, new visual conventions, and a social culture centered on friendship, hosting, conversation, and regular gatherings.

It felt both familiar and completely new.

That experience planted the first idea for Averill: Could a Mahjong set carry the warmth of the traditional family table while belonging naturally in the homes, friendships, and design culture of modern American players?

A Gap Between Beauty and Accessibility

As the team explored the American Mahjong market, it found a noticeable divide.

Many design-forward sets were positioned as expensive luxury purchases. At the other end of the market, more affordable marketplace options often gave less attention to original artwork, visual harmony, packaging, and the complete experience of owning or gifting a set. The team believed players should not have to choose between beauty, playability, quality, and an approachable price.

Averill began product development in January 2025 with a clear objective: create an original American Mahjong set that felt artistic enough to display and meaningful enough to give as a gift, while remaining recognizable, comfortable, and intuitive at the table.

Making Monet’s Garden

Monet’s Garden became Averill’s first collection.

Rather than reproducing a single painting, the design team developed an original tile world inspired by the atmosphere of an Impressionist garden: water lilies, layered flowers, botanical stems, hummingbirds, dragonflies, soft light, and coral-orange warmth.

Turning that atmosphere into a functional 160-tile American Mahjong system proved far more difficult than simply placing decorative artwork on a tile.

The collection went through five major design rounds, ten physical sampling rounds, and evaluations with five different factories. From the earliest concept to the finished set, development took approximately one year.

The flowers and Jokers presented the greatest challenge.

Early versions used abstract lines and light effects to capture the feeling of Monet’s work. They were visually expressive on paper, but the details could not be translated successfully into engraving and would have required surface printing.

The team felt this would compromise the tactile depth, durability, and sense of craftsmanship expected from a Mahjong tile. Instead of lowering the production standard, the artwork was redesigned.

The final special tiles moved toward recognizable, engravable garden imagery. Hummingbirds, dragonflies, and floral elements allowed the team to preserve the softness of the Monet-inspired atmosphere while introducing the warmth and familiarity associated with American garden life, particularly the gracious garden culture of the American South.

That decision became emblematic of Averill’s product philosophy: when artwork conflicts with readability, durability, or the physical experience of play, the design must continue to evolve.

Beautiful, but Still a Game

Throughout development, the team repeatedly returned to one question: Can players recognize the tiles comfortably while still feeling that the set is visually distinctive?

That balance has become one of the most frequently mentioned qualities in customer feedback. Players describe Monet’s Garden as thoughtful and full of small artistic details, while also praising its comfortable colors and clear, easy-to-read tile faces. For the team, this is the most meaningful response: customers recognize that the beauty of the set was designed around the way people actually play.

Since launching in March 2026, Averill has sold more than 1,000 Monet’s Garden sets across its sales channels.

www.averillmahjong.com