French designer and musician Lucas Lecacheur is creating wildly unconventional yet functional surfboards and skateboards, including a split board resembling crab pincers, a stingray-like shape, and a Brutalist board. Currently in Australia for Melbourne Design Week, Lecacheur is living and working out of At The Above gallery in Fitzroy, where he is crafting new boards like the cowboy boot-nosed Château Rouge. His designs, made with traditional materials like fiberglass, push the boundaries of surfboard norms while remaining rideable.
Lecacheur’s work matters because it merges performance art, rock-and-roll energy, and functional design, challenging the conventions of surf culture and product design. By treating style as a creative muscle and drawing from his background as a musician, he reinterprets a utilitarian object as a medium for artistic expression. His residency and participation in Melbourne Design Week highlight how design can intersect with personal identity and subcultural rebellion, inspiring both surfers and designers to rethink form and function.