Tony Longoria
Todd Oldham
Issue #26
The world’s most craftalicious man talks about vintage, modern, and why Susan Sarandon and his grandmother inspire him
By Amy Schroeder
Published: December 1st, 2005 | 12:00am
Todd Oldham is not just a person — he’s a brand. His name is synonymous for good design, which is why Target asked him to do dorm décor and La-Z-Boy hired him to reinvent their previously unstylish furniture.
Oldham isn’t afraid to try his hand at any creative medium. In addition to fashion and interior design, Oldham is a talented painter, photographer, and writer. The renaissance man’s credits include “Todd Time” on MTV’s House of Style, redesigning the Veruka nightclub in downtown Manhattan, and photographing people and places for Paper, Interview, Nest, and other magazines.
One of his latest projects is his Handmade Modern book, a collection of, you guessed it, modern design projects that the reader can make by hand, including plaster moon rock sculptures, instant window art, and a test-tube vase garden. Throughout the book, Oldham gives shout-outs to his favorite designers, such as Charles and Ray Eames, Isamu Noguchi, and George Nakashima. In late September 2005, he asked some of his friends to make the projects from his book for a five-part TV series on HGTV. Joan Jett helped to make an ottoman, Amy Sedaris made a tiny table, and Susan Sarandon made pillowcases. The items were auctioned on eBay and proceeds were donated to the American Red Cross to help hurricane survivors.
Though his name can sell just about anything, the 43-year-old is anything but your typical power-business mogul. Instead, he’s down to earth, socially and politically conscious, and likes working in a small New York studio. Oldham talks here about growing up crafty, quality vs. quantity, and one of his most “peculiar” design projects.
When and how did you realize that you wanted to be a designer?
I don’t think there was ever a choice. It was quite involuntary because as a kid, my parents and I just made endless stuff — just stuff and stuff and stuff. So it didn’t ever occur to me to not be a designer, really, because I was brought up to, if you had an idea or thought or needed something, you could make it or imagine it somehow. So it was kind of organic.
Are your parents artists or designers?
Yeah, they’re both amazing artists. My father’s more linear, because his artistry tends to go toward computers; he was an early computer whiz. And my mom is a remarkable, multi-disciplined artist. She can really work in just about any medium, and she chose to stick around with the four of us kids, so she was at home the whole time just spending all of it teaching us how to do stuff. It was very good.
What were you like in high school?
Invisible.
Really?
Yeah, in all of school, I was pretty invisible. … I moved a lot, went to lots of different schools — not because I got kicked out, just because I moved all the time. It was very easy to stay on the outside.
Were you into art and creative things in high school?
Yeah, absolutely. I’ve pretty much been the same ever since, had the same interests. I went to museums a lot, so I understood about the subtleties of art very early on.
Over the years, you’ve worked on so many projects, including fashion, furniture, and interior design, TV shows, books, and photography. What are you most proud of, and what have you had the most fun doing?
I guess maybe the proud part would just be able to sort of cause attention to go to people who need our help. We’ve been able to do a lot of fundraising and charity work, so if you have a public voice, it’s very nice, I think, to reflect it back into trying to help others. So that part has made me very happy to be able to do that stuff. And the most fun … I’d always answer the same thing, and it’s whatever I’m working on today. It’s pretty much the most fun, because everything I get to do is really fun.
What are you working on today [October 17, 2005]?
Well, I have a new line of furniture that La-Z-Boy produces for us, and my first free-standing store’s opening in New York in November, so we’re done fine-tuning bits and pieces of that this morning. And then I’m going up to Aperture Foundation, where I’m helping them with the fundraiser that’s going on in a few weeks, so we’re laying out the art. It’s been really great.
Tell me a little bit about the charity work and causes that you’re involved with.
Well, we’ve had an inherent standing about animals, and I don’t eat them, I don’t wear them, I don’t involve myself with any animal products, so it just seems very clear to me to try to help this group that really doesn’t have a voice at all. And we’re doing a lot of fundraising for AIDS.
What’s an average daily schedule like for you?
Well, mercifully, there is none. Every day is a different shade, which is great. I like getting up, I think I am totally non-linear, and some days I get up late, sometimes early, sometimes doing all of kinds of stuff, so it’s very nice. It makes me feel totally unemployed, my favorite feeling.
How do you stay on top of everything that you do?
I’m very organized, and I have amazing help from the people we work with. We’re a very small studio — there’s only eight of us. And everybody is really good. They inspire me, and they’re really good at being organized and achieving. Because that way, we can take the projects we want by keeping the studio small instead of being obliged to take projects because of overhead kind-of-stuff. So we made a choice to keep it lean and do the fun stuff.
What are some of your goals for the future?
I’d like to be able to do things the way we get to do furniture, which is nice and affordable. I’d like to be able to figure out a way to do that with a hotel. Why isn’t the most fun hotel $89 a night? It’s just always kind of sad when people are punished because they don’t have money. It’s a silly way to go about stuff, so when we did the furniture, we just introduced our new collection of market, which opens, actually, today. We made the cheapest, coolest sofas. Most of the time when you design these extensive things, you usually have to get homogenized so it reaches the biggest group of people, but we decided to go in reverse and try to make the more interesting — or the sharpest edge to it — the least expensive. It worked out really nicely, so I think that’s a better way to go about it.
Right now there’s a real boom in DIY, making your own stuff, and being creative. Why do you think that’s happening right now?
I think it’s a wonderful thing because the satisfaction one gets from creating something — whether it’s a cake or a table for your living room — it’s such a beautiful, nurturing, propelling emotion. It really does drive you forward, so I think that from that point of view, there’s just nothing bad that can come out of it. I think maybe the downside of it is that there’s a lot of it, so it’s kind of hard to sift through, so to speak.
What are some of your general design tips or theories?
Be singular in the moment. Nobody needs another thing, so you might as well do something original. Try to know your history, too. It’s important to know the history of design.
What has been your most educational experience, or who have you learned a lot from?
I’ve learned from lots of different people, but one of the best people that helped me along the way both physically and in inspiration was Susan Sarandon. When I did clothes and started out, she was very generous to me. We became good friends, and just the way she has maintained her dignity and lives her life — I think she’s the best example of a human being we could ever have. So to me, she is a real hero and a great guide.
What is —
And my grandmother, I’m sorry. Who’s very cool.
Can you tell me more about her?
The same words for Susan I could use for her, but they have completely different focuses. My grandmother has great dignity and she did whatever she wanted, especially at a time when that was not the choice for women to do. She riffled a lot of feathers, but she did what she wanted.
What kinds of things did she do?
She wasn’t linear, she didn’t think that you got married, you had your kids, and you stayed at home. She did things in unusual orders. She didn’t want to be at home, so she moved around a bit. She’s got a really interesting point of view that I appreciate very much.
What advice do you have for aspiring designers or creative entrepreneurs?
Be excited, be passionate about what you do. Honor your commitments. You have to be a Libra force all the time. You gotta keep that balance, because creativity is very important and vital to your soul, and the business side is important to getting it out there, so if you’re going to enter the commerce side of that, then make sure you have an eye on both of them. Don’t ignore one, because if either of them gets too big or out of control, it gets wrong. It’s about that right balance.
Did you figure out the business side of being a designer as you’ve gone along, or did you have some help?
I did have some help, and my parents have been great guides. I’ve also made about every single mistake that you could make — and there’s no better way to learn than to fuck up. So it’s just about how you go about it. I learned really early on that it’s just a matter if you learn from it, and the next version will be much more palatable. It’s important to take those chances that might lead you down funny paths. We have to be brave about that stuff. You know, who cares — we’re talking about design, it’s a very subjective business. What sucks is if you can’t pay people, that’s terrible, but if you’ve made something that maybe not everybody likes, that totally doesn’t matter.
If you could design your dream house, what would it look like and where would it be?
It would be in a quarry. I’ve always wanted to live in a quarry. I don’t know, it might not have all the walls, I’m not sure yet. I think it’d be nice to live in a quarry where you only had to have a three-walled house.
I read in your bio that you designed a Todd Oldham Barbie.
Oh yeah, I didn’t want to do that. My office kind of … it was one of the few things I caved in to do, because everyone else was excited about it. It’s just Barbie … her freaky body, and she’s all, you know, white, and it just seemed like I could sense about it all the despair she can bring in the world, as much as people have had fun with her. But I think we maybe did the biggest Barbie they’ve ever done? We got her waist widened, tried to do stuff, we tinted her skin so she was more olive-complected, and it was still a total freak-show body. It’s not like anything that brings anybody comfort (laughs), that’s for sure. But I gave it my best go. And we get people calling up saying, you know, collectors going, “You really shouldn’t do that, that color, because white Barbies are better.” That was a very peculiar experience, for me.
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