Rock & Roll Skateboard
The Rock & Roll Skateboard, developed in 2014, is a foundational piece that defines the studio’s theoretical framework. Emerged as the material outcome of Lucas Muñoz’s Master’s thesis at the Design Academy Eindhoven (2013-2014), this object is the physical embodiment of the Bastardism theory. This research explores creativity and inspiration sources within the artificial environment, proposing a hybridization of concepts that challenges the hierarchies of everyday objects. The design team conceived this piece as the "Mobility Foundation" within the broader FOUNDATIONS collection, which analyzes the origins of our built environment.
Conceptually, the Rock & Roll Skateboard seeks the most basic and poetic definition of a vehicle: a piece of ground on top of which you stand still while the land scrolls underneath. By replacing the conventional laminated wood deck with a raw piece of slate stone, the studio creates a surrealist experience. These stones, which have remained immobile for millions of years, are suddenly set in motion, "surfing" the man-made urban environment. This juxtaposition between the geological timescale of the rock and the ephemeral speed of skateboarding is the narrative heart of the work.
Technically, the object functions perfectly as a high-performance skateboard. The design team integrated standard skateboard gear—trucks, bearings, and polyurethane wheels—directly into the stone. Surprisingly, the use of slate is not merely an aesthetic gesture; its weight (varying between 70 and 90 kg depending on the model) provides unusual stability and an inertia that facilitates linear travel, offering a smoother and more stable ride than traditional lightweight boards. Each piece is unique, respecting the original shape and texture of the selected stone, reinforcing the identity of the piece as a cross between an objet trouvé and precision engineering.
As part of the FOUNDATIONS series, the Rock & Roll Skateboard has been widely recognized in international design forums for its ability to question material nature and our relationship with displacement. Through this project, the studio did not just design a means of transport; it established a working methodology that prioritizes deep material analysis and historical recontextualization, proving that design can be a powerful tool to reconnect the primal with the technological. https://vimeo.com/108230597?fl=pl&fe=vl