ForConstructionPros.com

Fu-Tung Cheng

The concrete countertop industry is going to grow. But how is it going to grow? What germ of inspiration will connect you and your first countertop to the ones you are going to be producing for your customers? How can you sustain both a business and your passion?

I say there is an artist in all of us. This industry started with a few people at about the same time in California in the 1980s. We came from related disciplines: David Hertz and Mark Rugero were trained as architects, Buddy Rhodes was a potter, I graduated from UC-Berkeley in Fine Arts. So the pioneers of this industry really began in the creative arts. To find that "artist" is a great way to light one's path in this business because as businesses we're on a relentless march of efficiency, grabbing markets and trying to be the most competitive. There's always pressure to economize, commercialize and scale up, but sometimes those things are antithetical to the very reason why we got into this business in the first place. If you can't have fun with what you're doing, you might as well not do it.

I say we're all inherently creative. Many of us naturally drew a lot, flung clay or built widgets when we were young. Then we went through the standardized education mill, faced the job market reality check and gave up some of our passion. Now to look inside and say "I want to do something totally inspiring" feels a bit subversive.

I say let's forget the idea we are just about countertops. Countertops are just the beginning, a segue into changing the way we think of our home environment. It's a chance to break that paradigm of kitchens as manufactured product and bring back a sense of creativity and craftsmanship to our work.

But how can we buck conformity and find our inspiration as creative individuals in this business? Ironically, by imitation. We generally don't associate imitation with creativity — we revere the artist with an original voice. But come to find out all "original" artists originally immersed and surrounded themselves with voices other than their own. If we can see that even one of the greatest American masters of popular culture, such as Bob Dylan, or the icon of European Impressionism Van Gogh, imitated their way to greatness, then I believe it gives us permission to do the same. Of course with all great artists it didn't end with imitation, it began there. Their craft evolved from the exploration, research, distillation and reverse engineering of those who inspired them.