Lodge Guest, Christoffer “Tjoffe” Stivén

What is your name ? Christoffer “Tjoffe” Stivén

Where do you live and where are you from ? Stockholm and born in Karlskrona

What size set up do you currenltly ride ? Urskog, model Gren, 8,7″

Any sponsors ? none

Family status ? Singel dad

School, work or both ? Work and work

How is a great normal day looking for you ? ( start from morning til late night) Go up in the morning with my son. He prefers a hot dog for breakfast (and lunch and dinner as well) so we “fight” a bit and finally I usually get him to eat some yogurt and then I drop him of at the kindergarten. I then take the tram to our carpentry and office in the south parts of Stockholm. When arriving at Urskog I start to check of some emails and sketch up a quick to do-list. This list contains everything from carpentry such as furnitures and custom designs for stores and pubic spaces to work on Urskog related products. If the emails are heavy to handle I just put them on Peter. Lately most of my time has been focused on wrapping up a collaboration with Swedish artist Mander and parallel to that finish the new Urskog model Barr.

Tell us how a good long weekend is looking for you A good long weekend is rare for me. When I don´t have my kid I usually work BUT I do care a lot for going out and stop by some bars. Since I used to be in the business my self it´s really fun to get to visit some old faces.

me in action at the capentry, cred: Robban Gustafsson (treborian)

How is your fall coming along and how has it been so far ? The fall has been good. We are looking forward to start selling new type of Urskog products, such as organic soap, raw cedar sticks, premium hats and cutting boards. This is something we have been working on for more than a year and it´s great to hear and see that people seem to like it!

Any projects you got going you wanna talk about ? Currently I have a project together with Peter Jeppson (mentioned above). He rents a studio at mine and also do some working for Urskog; photography, concept, collabs etc. Anyway, we will release a book in the beginning of 2018. It will be focused around art and primary acrylic and oil painting. It will be really fun and exiting to find a way to incorporate this with Urskog.

Do you read books ? if so, what do you read ? I read a lot of manuals. The latest is for a CO2 cutter which happens to be the latest contribute to the carpentry.

Who are you hanging out with at the moment ? Some people I have been around for quite a while now is skaters Peter, Dennis Olson, Martin Nagy and otherwise long time friends Kalle Jacobson, Bobo..

Tell us about the great crew you are bringing to the session next time… I fell pretty hard when I was 10 and hurted my leg. It is still completely blue from the ankle to the knee. And it was around this time I realized that I didn´t dare to skate anymore so I started to just cruise on bigger decks. After some cruising I fell again when I was hitching a ride from a car and this time I faceplanted a curb and (luckily) ”just” broke my shinbone and got a massive concussion. After this I decided that I don´t dare to either skate or cruise on longboards/cruisers anymore. Although I skate a couple of days each year to test out the new models but this is usually on my own actually.

How great is your crew really end of the day ? My crew is great. They are all a part of Urskog in one way or the other. It´s really a friends and family company.

Do you plan any fall or winter skatemissions ? No I don´t. I will teach my son to skate in the coming summer.

Who and what is your motivation at the moment ? It might sound a bit cheezy but at the moment my son is my greatest inspiration. And it is just as simple as he has to have food on the table and shoes on his feet, which means that Urskog has to go around in one way or another. In general I get very inspired when people think a little extra to make good products with a sustainable thinking.

How do you think your future will look like ? I´m optimistic for the future but we all have to stop this silly consumption of crap. We need to think about how much shit we are leaving to mother earth to take care of. when we have thought about this for a while we need to change our behavior. Simple as that.

What else is going on ? Hmm. I have started to play badminton. It is funny and I hope I don´t slam..

What do you do besides skateboarding ? Work and socialize..

What is your to go to resturants ? Scandic Downtown Camper, close friends of mine runs a great bar called 20hundra5 and for the late nights we go to a bar on Kungsholmen called Lemon.

Whats your top 3 favorite meals ? Me and Peter is always experimenting with different veggie dishes at Urskog, something I really like and sometimes it is really boring. Otherwise I really appreciate cooking with simple flavors combined to perfection.

Whats your top 3 favorite drinks ? Beer, tap water and any OP Andersson based drinks

How do you see the future of skateboarding ? Bright, evolving, high standards but that´s nothing new. I like how bowl and tranny is getting more trendy, I prefer watching that a little bit more than tech street skating. Al though I feel like the slappy trend has allowed another street climate to grow. Today some skaters seem to focus on high speed and good style before the most difficult tricks, which I really enjoy.

Do you you have other hobbys besides skateboarding ? Besides Urskog and the badminton I like to just hang with friends and think of potentials with wood.

Who do we need to interview on the lodge ? You should talk to Peter. He is interesting and is both a great skateboarder and a great paintier/sculptural artist. It´s really fun to see that his name start to appear outside Sweden. I like to give myself some of that cred since I always have been nice with the rent. I think I will start to take rent in artwork soon. But not quite yet. haha

Last Question…what you got ? Last questions.. hmm.. Make sure to let me know when you´re in Sweden. You have an open invitation to our new carpentry and showroow for some skating.

Come on, tell us a slippery story. I once tried to make it into the UK market. I spent shitloads of money and even more time just to get ripped off and the company was on the verge off bankruptcy. Thats a slippery one.