Five disciplines.
One coherent practice.

Studio Eckström

As Director of Operations and co-founder of Studio Eckström, Mikal oversees the full operational infrastructure of a luxury full-service residential interior design practice — client intake, project coordination, construction progress documentation, financial strategy, and the editorial voice that defines the studio's communications at every touchpoint.

The studio is led alongside Creative Director Mark Eckström and serves a nationwide client base from Omaha, Nebraska, with a reputation built on rigor, restraint, and the quality of its client relationships.

• Featured in Architectural Digest
• Covered by The Wall Street Journal
• Kips Bay Decorator Show House participant
• Houzz Award for Best Midwest Design
• Nationwide residential portfolio

Digital Strategy & Web Architecture

Mikal leads all digital architecture for Studio Eckström — a 13-page custom HTML/CSS/JS site built with real photography, project pages, testimonials, press coverage sections, Typeform contact integration, and comprehensive Schema.org structured data targeting the luxury residential design market in Nebraska and nationally.

He also designed and delivered the complete web presence for saintsandliars.org — the promotional site for Debórah Dwork's book published by W.W. Norton — including archival photography processing, SEO, LLM readability optimization, and legal compliance pages across eight responsive pages.

• Schema.org markup: Person, LocalBusiness, FAQPage, BreadcrumbList
• SEO targeting "Omaha Interior Design" and "Best Interior Designer Nebraska"
• GEO and LLM search readability — llms.txt, sitemap, structured data
• Portfolio index with JavaScript filter bar
• Westchester County photography optimization for web delivery

Scholarship, Writing & Editorial Direction

Mikal holds a PhD from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, specializing in Digital Humanities and Great Plains history, completed under advisors Margaret Jacobs and Katrina Jagodinsky — two of the leading scholars in Indigenous and Western American history. His graduate formation also included work at Clark University under mentor Debórah Dwork and advisors Taner Akçam and Wim Klooster, shaping a scholarly sensibility that spans Holocaust history, genocide studies, and Atlantic world history.

His research was recognized by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Foundation. The editorial voice he developed for Studio Eckström is literary and unhurried — three paragraphs, three sentences, first-person plural. The same discipline applied at a different scale.

• PhD: Digital Humanities and Great Plains History — University of Nebraska–Lincoln
• Advisors: Margaret Jacobs and Katrina Jagodinsky (UNL)
• Clark University: mentor Debórah Dwork; advisors Taner Akçam and Wim Klooster
• Research funded by NEH and Ford Foundation
• Studio editorial voice: three paragraphs, three sentences, literary register

Cultural Event Production

Mikal produces literary and cultural events at the intersection of scholarship, journalism, and public conversation. His collaborators have included Elise Loehnen — author and podcast host whose work explores the interior life and cultural change — and Rebecca Clarren, a journalist and author whose reporting on Indigenous communities and the American West makes her a natural interlocutor for the questions Mikal cares most about.

The Saints & Liars event series at Strauss Hall, University of Nebraska Omaha brings together writers, historians, and thinkers for wide-ranging conversations on history, truth, and storytelling. His role spans full logistics, speaker itineraries, podium introduction writing and delivery, and intimate book gatherings.

• Venue: Strauss Hall, University of Nebraska Omaha
• Collaborators: Elise Loehnen and Rebecca Clarren
• Saints & Liars event series — April 2026
• Podium introduction: the "nest" metaphor address
• Book party hosting, speaker itinerary coordination

Philanthropic Advising — Indigenous Giving

Mikal has begun taking on select philanthropic advising engagements focused on Indigenous giving — bringing his doctoral training in Great Plains history and his direct engagement with Indigenous scholarship to questions of how philanthropic resources can best support Indigenous communities, organizations, and land-based initiatives.

This work is grounded, not abstract. His PhD research on the Great Plains and his scholarly relationships with historians of Indigenous communities give him a foundation that most philanthropic advisors simply do not have. The work is selective and relationship-driven by design.

• Grounded in PhD research on Great Plains history and Indigenous communities
• Focus on Indigenous-led organizations and land stewardship initiatives
• Historically informed, community-responsive philanthropic strategy
• Great Plains context: Omaha, Ponca, Lakota nations and others
• Inquiries welcome at me@mikaleckstrom.com