My SUQURU Story

In 2019, I moved my freelance design and communication business into the beautiful Studio “RudolfElf” in Berlin Friedrichshain. My friend Sascha had created and refined this space over many years. Somewhere in the back he had improvised a makeshift lamp shade, made from antique technical drawings that he had found somewhere.

Admittedly: it doesn’t look like much in this photo and in no way reflects Sascha’s wonderful taste and skill when it comes to interior design – BUT when I saw this contraption I thought: “Wow, what a cool idea. If one were to add wooden rings as contrast elements, then this could look like a Bauhaus designer lamp with a Japanese touch”.

And so I went to a DIY store, bought some veneer and used some of those technical drawings along with paper clips to see whether wooden rings and transparent paper would look as cool together as I thought.
My conclusion was: Oh yes, they do.

This marked the start of a 6 year long adventure of learning woodworking techniques and prototyping with a lot of trial & error, until I arrived at a stunning product with a reliable and – most importantly – a responsible manufacturing process. This aspect was actually what sparked my curiosity back in 2019. I asked myself: if you have a product idea in this day and age, what would be the most thoughtful and responsible way of designing and producing it?

During these 6 years, I did so much research and tested so many ways of doing things that I regard this learning experience just as valuable as my university degrees. Along the way I also collected many anecdotes and I’ll soon share them on the blog, via insta and LinkedIn, including the lessons they came with.

To be honest: I don’t fully understand why I ended up going so deep and becoming so serious about all of this. Sometimes I think this particular lamp shade just wanted to be made a reality and chose me for some of my nerdish traits. Or maybe I was meant to do exactly this kind of work, because every time I go to my studio, I feel blessed that I get to make these beautiful things and to make all these wonderful connections to you, my customers.