In the studio: Spiritual Objects
Follow us as we visit Spiritual Objects, Luc Fuller’s multi-disciplinary studio in Los Angeles. The Palette Cutting Board and Disco Coasters are our first collaboration with the designer. Both Disco and Palette are typically irreverent, reflecting Fuller’s playful sensibility for shapes and materials. They are an object of curiosity, a pop culture motif, bringing the party directly to your table.
Photography Jordan Vouga
What inspired the shapes/forms of the Palette Cutting Board and Disco Coasters?
Both the Palette Cutting Board and the Disco Coasters are simple shapes that I have been drawn to for a very long time - the music note is something that showed up in my paintings almost ten years ago when I was primarily working as a fine artist. I was equally influenced by hard-edged painters such as Ellsworth Kelly, as I was a Pop Artist, and like Claes Oldenburg. It wasn’t until I stumbled upon the Italian Radical Designers of the ’60s and ’70s (who were also influenced by those Pop Artists) that I realized the same elements from my paintings could be used to make functional objects. The cutting board and the Disco Stool (which later also became the Disco Coasters) were the first two “design” objects I made and led to me eventually starting Spiritual Objects.
How do you design your pieces? Where do you start?
Nine times out of ten it starts with drawing. Sometimes I’ll get an idea for a piece, and then immediately start sketching in my sketchbook, but just as often, I’ll stumble upon ideas through the act of drawing itself. I tend to let the idea dictate the material, process, and the forms the designs inevitably end up taking. I think my approach to design is more idea, and emotionally driven than it is material or process, but of course, if you don’t marry the right idea to the right material, and execution, a design will never succeed. As I develop my practice, I’m learning more and more that good design, and more generally, a good idea, is all in the nuance - and in truth, even the silliest, seemingly dumb ideas, can become the best designs if given the right amount of love and attention to material, details, and execution.
“Even the silliest, seemingly dumb ideas can become the best designs, if given the right amount of love.”
Explain the process of making this product, have you used these manufacturing methods and materials previously?
The Palette Cutting Board was the first piece that I completed for Spiritual Objects and one that remains a favorite of mine. I was working on several other objects, all at various stages of completion at the time, and the cutting board eked its way out ahead of the others. It’s probably the only thing that I’ve gotten right the first time around, without any failed drafts, design revisions or tweaks.
The Disco Coasters, even though seemingly simple, were more of a challenge as I had never worked with leather before, and to get the pieces just right, required tracking down just the right material and craftspeople to execute according to the vision I had in my head.
Did you have a specific environment in mind when you were designing the pieces?
I’ve always loved domestic settings and the objects that we use every day. In my life many of these objects - a cup, a knife, a coaster, a lamp etc, tell a story, remind me of a person, a place, or an experience, and end up bringing joy to my life on a daily basis. My challenge now, and what inspires me most as a designer is to look at even the most mundane, inconsequential of objects, and reimagine them into something that goes beyond their mere use value, into something less tangible, i.e. the spirit of an object.
I lived with the original coaster prototypes—and still do—for over a year before releasing them. I was surprised at how much of an impact such a small seemingly low-stakes group of objects could have on a space. I love seeing them migrate throughout our space, stacked on books, stools, and tables, and strewn all over the floor by our son.
