TLDR: Ashley Rae Morrill was born on January 27, 1976, in Orono, Maine, and is the lead designer on Maine Cabin Masters on the Magnolia Network. She is Chase Morrill’s sister, not his wife — her husband is Ryan Eldridge, the crew’s foreman.
Before the show she ran an antique shop in Hallowell, Maine, earned a Graphic Design degree from the University of Maine, and spent time living in Colorado.
She launched her own art and decor brand, Rustic County, in 2023. She and Ryan have no children but are devoted dog parents currently to a pup named Frankie.
The most common misconception about Maine Cabin Masters is that Ashley Morrill is Chase Morrill’s wife. She is his sister. The man standing next to her on the crew, the quiet foreman who organizes the builds and keeps the operation running, is Ryan Eldridge. That’s her husband.
Once you understand the actual family structure the show makes considerably more sense. It’s a sibling partnership at its core, built on a shared childhood in Maine and a father who taught them both that construction was an act of historical stewardship rather than just a job.
She Grew Up Learning to Build Before She Learned to Decorate
Ashley was born on January 27, 1976, in Orono, Maine, and grew up in the Augusta and Manchester areas alongside her younger brother Chase.
Their father Eric Morrill was a master builder who passed his philosophy down to both children: that old materials had value, that reclaimed wood was better than new, and that the right way to approach a structure was to understand its history before you changed anything about it.
The Morrill family was salvaging and picking long before American Pickers made it a television genre. This wasn’t a hobby. It was how they lived. Ashley absorbed that ethic completely, and it became the foundation of everything she does on the show.
When she saves a homeowner’s existing furniture rather than replacing it, or repurposes old barn wood into a feature wall, she’s not being creative. She’s being her father’s daughter.
Eric Morrill died of cancer in 2014. Ashley has cited him as her primary inspiration throughout her career. The crew’s collective work ethic, the sense that a job done badly is a form of disrespect to the material, traces directly back to him.
She Has a Graphic Design Degree and Spent Years in Colorado
Ashley attended the University of Maine at Orono and graduated with a degree in Graphic Design, which explains more about her role on the show than most viewers realize. The color theory, spatial reasoning, and visual branding that make her cabin interiors work are not instinctive — they are trained skills applied to a rustic context.
After graduating she moved to Colorado, following a pattern common among young Mainers who head west before eventually coming home. She lived there for several years, exposed to the Western lodge aesthetic and the nature-focused interiors of ski towns that would later influence her rustic-chic design sensibility.
Ryan Eldridge, who would become her husband, was living about a hundred miles away in Wyoming during the same period without either of them knowing the other was there.
She Ran an Antique Shop in Hallowell Before Anyone Had Heard of the Show
When Ashley returned to Maine in her early thirties, she opened The Potluck Shop, an antique and home goods boutique in Hallowell that she ran alongside her sister-in-law. The shop sold salvaged barn wood furniture and vintage goods sourced through the family’s picking networks.
This is the origin of her real expertise — not the television version where she shows up at the end of a build to hang things on walls, but the practical knowledge of what reclaimed materials are worth and how to use them.
The Potluck Shop was operating years before Maine Cabin Masters premiered in 2017. By the time cameras arrived, Ashley already had a decade of experience in exactly the kind of material sourcing and design work the show required. The show didn’t create her career. It found it.
Her Husband Proposed the Day After a Willie Nelson Concert
Ashley and Ryan Eldridge grew up in neighboring towns and knew each other for years before anything romantic developed. After a breakup, Ashley moved into Ryan’s house as a roommate.
Ryan describes what happened next with characteristic understatement: “As soon as she started crossing the hall, she became the girlfriend.” Ashley disputes this version of events for its lack of nuance, but the outcome is the same.
Ryan proposed in July 2014, the day after a Willie Nelson concert. They married later that same month. Their relationship is anchored by a shared obsession with jam band music — Phish and the Grateful Dead in particular — which has become a running thread through their personal lives.
They co-own The Woodshed in Manchester, Maine, a community venue built around live music and the restoration of historical Phish memorabilia.
They have no children. They are devoted dog parents, currently to a pup named Frankie. Their previous dogs Gus and Charlie, who appeared regularly on the show, both passed away in 2018 and are still missed by longtime fans.
What She Actually Does on the Show Is More Than Decoration
The on-camera version of Ashley — the one who disappears when heavy lifting starts and gets gently teased by Chase and Ryan for it — is a character the show has built around her for comedic rhythm.
The off-camera reality is different.
She manages the entire interior design team, maintains relationships with the local artisans who contribute to each build, and is the primary decision-maker on every final look.
Her approach is specifically not to impose a suburban aesthetic on a Maine hunting cabin. She reads each structure and each owner’s history and designs toward what the space should feel like rather than what would look impressive on camera.
Fans consistently praise her for it.
The show’s famously low budgets are partly possible because of her ability to repurpose existing materials rather than sourcing everything new.
For the full story of Maine Cabin Masters as a whole including where the show currently stands and whether it is still filming in 2026, that’s covered separately.
She Launched Her Own Brand in 2023
In 2023, Ashley launched Rustic County, her own art and decor business. The brand sells her original watercolor and oil paintings on products including throw pillows, tea towels, serving trays, and tote bags. Her subjects are deeply Maine — loons, moose, lobsters, blueberries, pine cones — rendered in a rustic-chic style that translates the cabin aesthetic into items people can take home.
Rustic County is a woman-owned operation that she runs with a small team of close collaborators. She involves her audience in the design process through polls and questionnaires, asking fans which animals or themes should appear in upcoming collections.
A dog-themed line was prioritized in early 2024 after overwhelming fan demand. The brand sells through her website and through the Kennebec Cabin Company retail store in Manchester.
Where Ashley Morrill Is in 2026
Ashley Morrill is 50 years old and based in Manchester, Maine, where she has lived since returning from Colorado decades ago. Maine Cabin Masters is now in its 12th season on the Magnolia Network. She continues to work alongside Chase and Ryan on the builds, run Rustic County, and co-manage The Woodshed with Ryan.
She is notably private for someone on a nationally broadcast show, preferring to go unrecognized during her daily life in Maine. The fame that came with the show was not something she sought and is not something she particularly enjoys.
What she enjoys is the work itself — the material, the history of a structure, the moment when a cabin that looked beyond saving becomes something a family will use for another generation.
She ran an antique shop in Hallowell for years before the cameras arrived. The show didn’t change what she was. It just gave it an audience.
