Luka Stepan continued his studies at the Royal College of Art in London, after graduating from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana.
He received guidance from Professor Ron Arad at the RCA, and worked as a freelance designer in the UK for several renowned London studios – among them Tangerine – and Luka is now based in Ljubljana with his own design studio. ‘Why am I making yet another chair? Yes, that’s a good question! There are really way too many chairs in the world, and lots of them are really bad since they don’t last long, not even culturally. Lucky is made without any compromises or short-cuts, and while it’s not a cheap chair, it’s actually an investment because you can count on using it for a long time.’
As a designer, I appreciate restrictions regardless of whether they are related to with artistic expression, marketing issues, sociological concerns etc. It is these restrictions that make you bound to find successful solutions.’
3 questions to Luka
DESIGN THAT CAN BE IMPROVED?
Car design obviously; it can’t just be about styling, can it? It’s not enough that Tesla challenges the other manufacturers, there’s lot to do: how do you improve on the interior and how do you interact with all the electronics at your command? And being in charge of so much deadly power in the street, how do you develop the auto- matic system keeping everything in check? If we will have driverless cars in a sharing economy, what will they look like? What kind of sociological and cultural challenges are we facing?
THE LAST BOOK YOU READ?
The Architectures of Atelier Bow-Wow: Behaviorology. I’m fascinated with the Japanese metabolists of the 1950s and how their work applies to the architects of today, especially when we look for new types of dwellings for new lifestyles.
LATEST MUSIC EXPERIENCE?
The Serbian indie-pop band Repetitor; they are at their best live
