Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Culture

Yes, these guitars are made from recycled skateboard decks

By

Art comes in a multitude of colors, shapes, and forms — just ask San Franciscan Nick Pourfard, the sole founder and primary employee of Prisma Guitars. The 23-year old student and self-taught woodworker has spent the better part of four years transforming thin pieces of wood culled from broken and used skateboard decks into electric guitars, simultaneously trading one instrument of shredding for another.

Related: Out of the studio and into the woods: our favorite backpacking guitars

Recommended Videos

16273385330_f5a2479fe2_bAlthough Pourfard has long had a resounding penchant for woodworking, he first learned to build guitars via a host of instructional YouTube videos. Today, he continues to tweak and further refine his initial crafting process alongside childhood friend Michael Svendsen — the guy who taught him how to make skateboard half pipes — though, he won’t elaborate too much on the process for fear of being copied. However, we do know he hand builds each guitar from start to finish within his garage in the city’s Sunset District, carefully taking into account the melange of patterns and colors unique to each board he decides to utilize.

“Just being a skater, you know that the colors [of a skateboard] go all the way through,” he recently told San Francisco’s 7×7 magazine in an interview. “I figured, what if I could just totally make a normal guitar, shape-wise, and sound-wise?”

Prisma GuitarsThe guitar cuts and designs to a cue from classic examples, too. The “Corvina,” for instance, was inspired by the the infamous Rickenbacker, while guitars like the “The Duke” feature a mahogany body and a maple top much like the Les Paul of yesteryear. The “Diavolo” takes design a step further, building upon a classic semi-hollow build, complete with three humbuckers, three-way controls, and a volume knob for each pickup.

And if the guitars themselves don’t speak for themselves, Pourfard’s clients will. Iron Maiden’s Steve Harris bought one, as well as pro skater Justin Figueroa, who plays in the acid-rock band Harsh Toke. The $2,500+ price tag might be a deterrent for some, but honestly, did you think buying 15 skateboard decks was going to be cheap?

Check out Prisma online to place a custom order, or to browse the company’s excellent collection of electric guitars and related accessories.

Brandon Widder
Brandon Widder
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Brandon Widder is a journalist and a staff writer for the Manual and its brother site, Digital Trends, where he covers tech…
The Righteous Gemstones season 4: Everything we know so far
The uncouth dark comedy returns for one more final season
Danny McBride

Although almost every HBO show gets plenty of attention and critical acclaim, The Righteous Gemstones doesn't seem to have gotten the popularity or recognition it deserves. The show is a daring, unique, and unsuppressed satire of religion, televangelism, and the effects of cultism in the U.S. Eli Gemstone is the patriarch of the Gemstone family. His misadventures with his children are a hilarious critique of the immorality of religious leaders and the dirty money that's involved in leading a megachurch or any sort of large-scale religious operation.

The series manages to keep everything lighthearted despite the serious topics it satirizes, something that is a true touchstone of some of the best dark comedies in the history of television. We are so excited for The Righteous Gemstones to return for its fourth and final season on HBO and Max, and the premiere is right around the corner. Here is everything we know about The Righteous Gemstones season 4, from the returning cast members to shows you should watch in the meantime and the release date of the final season.
Who is starring in The Righteous Gemstones season 4?

Read more
Will there be a second season of ‘Agatha All Along?’
Marvel's head of TV also expressed interest in returning to Hawkeye.
The cast of Agatha All Along

Although the series was centered on a supporting character from WandaVision, Agatha All Along quickly became one of the more successful Marvel shows following its premiere in 2024. The show was so successful, in fact, that according to reporting in Entertainment Weekly, the studio is eager to make another season, but doesn't want to rush into production.

Brad Winderbaum, the head of streaming, television, and animation for Marvel told the magazine that he was intrigued by the possibility of bringing the show back. "A show like Agatha, to me, is concept based. Yes, a second season for sure is something that we would want to do, but let's not rush it. Let's get the right idea and then make it," he said.

Read more
Greta Gerwig might be planning to adapt every ‘Narnia’ book
The previous series of adaptations only made it to three installments.
Greta Gerwig directing Barbie.

Following up on the success of Barbie, Greta Gerwig could have made basically whatever she wanted. It's telling, then, that she decided to dive head first into an adaptation of C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. Now, following the news that Gerwig's adaptation will be released exclusively in IMAX theaters for at least two weeks before it hits theaters, IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond has suggested that Netflix might be planning to adapt all eight of Lewis's novels.

"This was a really great movie [for us] because I think there are like eight movies planned … and what Imax does best is launch franchises and launch events, [and] this is the kind of movie that is very conducive to an Imax release. It’s also not as unusual as you think," Gelfond said in an interview with Deadline.

Read more