Page 64 - Star Wars Insider #188
P. 64
BY ROYAL DECREE
a room in a house to a full-on requesting custom ‘fan cave’ rooms “It’s that
workshop. Along the way, Spina or replicas of movie props to
has hired artists with experience display in eye-catching locations. beautiful
in such diverse skills as sculpting,
prop-making, and painting— Going Solo, Together effects-style
people with an eye for the kind “We are huge prop fans, and we
sculpting that
of crafts used in fi lm, especially wanted to find a way to bring that
from decades past, where a lot of filmmaking artistry into the home,”
the company’s work originates. Spina notes. “We looked at this I love so much.”
Almost inevitably, Tom Spina amazing stuff that, decades later,
Designs gravitated towards still keeps us up at night wondering
house installations, with clients how they did it, and we thought, idea—a full-size, frozen Han Solo
‘Can we turn that into furniture? from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes
Can we turn that into something Back (1980) built into a glass-
02 Melissa Ocampo and Tom Spina functional?’ And it turned out that topped table, suitable for an offi ce
carefully give the restored Muftak
costume a shampoo and comb. we could.” or living room—was stylish and
The company’s big break came more than a little droll. It was a
03 The Muftak restoration team at
Tom Spina Designs pose with the when it created the now famous fresh, practical take on one of the
reinvigorated cantina alien. Han Solo In Carbonite table. The franchise’s most memorable scenes.
Originally built at the request of a
Grammy award-winning musician
02
to sell at a charity auction, the
table’s design, by Spina and his
long-time business partner, Richard
Riley, then went viral.
“I love that we can take these
dynamic elements, which would
normally be moving, and freeze
them in time,” says Spina. “We
capture a moment from this fi lm,
lay a piece of glass on it, and now
it’s this combination sculptural art
piece and furniture for your house.”
His team was then hired to
recreate the cantina creatures from
A New Hope for a Volkswagen
commercial—‘The Dog Strikes
Back’—that aired during the 2012
Super Bowl. They even built the
cantina set seen in the commercial,
which subsequently led to Tom and
his crew restoring costumes and
03
props for Lucasfi lm’s archives
and displays.
Following this collaboration
with the film company, combined
with the success of his domestic
installations, Spina began to realize
there was potential for a new
business. As a result, Regal Robot
was launched in April 2017, selling
handmade Star Wars furniture
and home decor, as well as taking
custom commissions for one-off
or luxury pop-culture art pieces.
“People don’t think they can
normally access those things,”
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