Meet Leonard Bessemer of Objects for Objects in Lincoln Heights

Today we’d like to introduce you to Leonard Bessemer.

Leonard, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
In college, I studied Art and I wanted to make films, but I spend most my time building DIY dollies, jibs, and stabilizers rather than actually making films. That was kinda a sign that the fantasy of what I wanted to do wasn’t actually what I wanted to do. Not sure of my next steps after college, a friend and I moved to Berlin on a whim. It was there that I started to work for the British artist David Thorpe. We would make these massive furniture like objects. I had always built things, but I never had any formal training beyond YouTube videos and just figuring things out on my own.

When I moved back to the states, I worked a bunch of random jobs and would do random fabrication and construction jobs for family and friends. I figured if I could make a sculpture – I could also make a cabinet or shelf. From there, I built out my friend Ali Golden’s flagship store in Oakland, CA and when it came time for her to open LA shop I moved here to build it out. I was basically living in the shop while I built it. I did everything with a with a Festool Tracksaw and some saw horses. From there, I got more retail and residential buildout jobs such as the cabinetry and a lot of the fixtures for Eightfold Coffeeshop next door. I was pretty much doing whatever would pay the bills, and charging a lot less than what I should have, but thats what you have to do when you are starting out.

I eventually got my own shop space in Lincoln Heights, where I am now, thanks to Patrick Cain Designs who I met at the Rosebowl while shopping for some side tables for the Ali Golden store. I’d pretty much buy more tools with whatever money I made on build-outs to outfit my shop. I got really tired of shlepping my tools and material to job sites and always having to reinvent the wheel on every job, so I started making my own furniture pieces that were mostly for me, and things I thought would be nice to exist in the world. I had no idea how to sell it or what to do with it, but I would spend any extra time I had, when I wasn’t working 16 hr days to meet deadlines, working on my own pieces. I’d build things, photograph them, post them, and sell them for basically cost if not below and eventually, it catches someone’s eye and things start to happen. I was building out a lot of Weed store pop ups when Leah Ring of Another Human reposted an image of my wavy bench and invited me to be apart of the first Object Permanence exhibition. A few weeks later, Urban Outfitters and Architectural Digests’ Clever reached out to me about being apart of their Artist Edition collection. Things have since taken off in terms and I’ve just been trying to keep up and figure it all out as I go. It is all still a ton of work, exhausting, and money isn’t falling from the sky, but I can see a tiny bit of light at the end of the tunnel and I have no idea what else I’d be doing if I wasn’t doing this.

Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
I don’t think starting or running a business is ever a smooth road, even though businesses try to make it seem like it is all fine and dandy, we are all just figuring it out and putting out fires as we go – some more or less than others.

I pretty much have done almost everything myself, hiring some help here and there, but I’m beginning to realize my limitations as an individual. I can only do so much.

As for struggles, there have been lots of all nighters, lots of not knowing how I was going to pay bills each month, and lots of working for pennies on the hour because I made a bad bid that ended up being way to low for the amount of work. There are lots of ups and downs, but things are at least going in the right trajectory.

Objects for Objects – what should we know? What do you do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
I design and make contemporary and collectible furniture and objects. At the moment I do everything in house by hand, but am looking to outsource some of my fabrication because I can only do so much with two hands and should be spending more of my time focusing on other parts of my business.

I use lots of color and material-oriented in my designs and I make things that other people don’t. I’m a perfectionist and I think that translates to the pieces I make. I strive to create pieces that will enhance people’s lives and their living spaces, something that you can smile at every time you enter your home; Something you can’t just ignore or put out on the street when you move.

What is “success” or “successful” for you?
I think most people’s idea of success is overrated. Fame, Instagram followers, ‘likes’, shouldn’t be the goal, they should just be the symptom of doing something well. My idea of success is being financially stable enough that I can focus on designs and creating without financial pressures making me feel limited in what I can do. I think recognition by colleagues and publications in the industry is also nice, but in the end – if I can make things I like and that I’m proud of and have people buy them and appreciate them – that is success.

Contact Info:

• Address: 336 S Avenue 16
  Los Angeles, CA 90031
• Website: www.objectsforobjects.com
• Email: info@objectsforobjects.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/objectsforobjects/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/objectsforobjects/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/objects4objects

Image Credit:
Ye Rin Mok, Urban Outfitters

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