The definitions, approaches and results of combining play, passion and purpose are subjective for creatives across disciplines. Judging from Swedish designer-maker Love Hultén’s unique creations, the demarcations are demystified, the intent, playful and tactile. Apparatrum, his debut monograph published by Volume, charts the innovator’s idiosyncratic approach to making offbeat custom synthesisers and videogame cabinets, through exclusive, extensive sketches, photographs, solo commentaries and BTS moments.

The audiovisual artist, electronic engineer and woodworker from Gothenburg, Sweden, is known to craft everything by hand. From employing chattering teeth as musical conduits to translating cacti’s biodata to MIDI, or turning heartbeats into music, Hultén’s objects teem with personality, revelling high in the element of the unexpected. In a sea of monotonous product designs, his zany, customised contraptions have shone through as joyous, peculiar machines which keep at their core, oddity and tactility.

“Almost a decade after going viral with R-Kaid-R, a small wooden box that flips open to reveal a portable arcade machine with 10,000 games, Hultén has taken the world by storm with his bespoke handcrafted designs. Merging hand-hewn carpentry and modern electronics, he combines unexpected elements to present us with an alternative reality through his captivatingly high-concept objects. From fake eyeballs and chattering teeth to cacti and dancing crabs, Hultén’s playfully subversive and humorous contraptions turn our conception of how we interact with machines on its head,” mentions Volume, the London-based publishing platform powered by international art publisher Thames & Hudson.

His work has garnered enthusiasts, collectors and musicians including Eminem, Michael B Jordan, Kid Cudi and A$AP Rocky, vying for one-of-a-kind, specific looking and even more explicitly doing objects. This book allows one into the process of how these eccentric electronics, which might combine old-school gaming devices with musical instruments, or plants with keyboards, are ideated and made. The almost 300 pages of the new hardcover dissect and divulge the very influences and inspirations behind Hultén’s creativity, accounted through a green san-serif font text and accompanying, neatly arranged visuals.

"Apparatrum is a Swedish term for a mechanical room (central heating, power routing, electric panels, water heaters, etc). My studio used to be an Apparatrum in the old days, and the sign is still there, embedded into the brick wall above my entry door. Just seems like a very fitting title," Hultén tells STIR, explaining the reasoning behind the name of the monograph.

Delightfully weird and largely wonderful, Hultén’s bespoke works are described by him as ‘custom alientech’ and ‘craftporn,’ plunging far beyond the set margins of conventional design to create synthesisers, sound sculptures and videogame consoles with direct interfaces. Placing sense perceptions in almost abnormal, atypical and ambiguous aesthetical and design contexts, the Swedish artist and product designer fuses traditional craftsmanship with modern technology, woodworking and electronics, music with arcade games and analogue constructs with digital techniques.

“Our digital world is expanding and to connect with the real world, we need physical interaction. I want my objects to create a state of curiosity – using references from both past and present,” shares Hultén, a musician himself, on creating elaborate, commissioned synths for years now.

His works also recontextualise the objects we recognise, reorganising with the conceptions, social, cultural and historical, related to them, often mismatching elements to an extent that newer contexts are exposed. “His designs somehow feel born of both childlike nostalgia and precise engineering – LEGO meets Le Corbusier,” mentions Madison Bloom, Pitchfork. Rightfully so.

Authored by Hultén himself, the monograph provides a unique insight into his oeuvre, charting a decade of his creative output while delving deep into the technical details that beget his bright, unique craft. Volume indicates that each featured synthesiser and videogame device in the book is complemented by Hultén's commentaries and observations, revealing “his visionary design process and eclectic influences, from retrofuturism and science fiction to Dieter Rams and mid-century design”.

Each step-by-step case study breaks down his now ‘secretive’ creative process, journeying from initial conceptual sketches to the finished product. Apart from visiting his portfolio, Apparatrum also studies his creative evolution as an artist and woodworker, in tandem with a rare, exclusive tour of his Gothenburg workshop. “Comprising multiple paper stocks and bound in a dual-cover case with tipped-on images, this book is essential for fans of this singular designer-maker's 'alientech' oeuvre,” they reiterate.

Apparatrum follows Works (2022), Hultén’s first book which features his selected works from 2016 to 2022. Currently, in its crowdfunding stage, the book has several editions, including the slipcased, special edition signed and limited to 250 copies. Featuring an intricate fold circuit-board illustration gracing an elegant green fabric designed by Hultén himself, the striking artwork indulges in abstracted graphic forms and subtle nods to some of the Swedish artist’s whimsical customised machines.

On how the book's stylistic design choices relate to his idiosyncratic portfolio, Hultén shares with STIR, "I think the images speak for themselves and from my point of view, it hasn't been much of a stylistic debate here. The concept is pretty simple, just big images, and a lot of them. My passion for photography is as big as my passion for creating and I do all my shooting and editing as well. The transformation from a back-lit monitor viewing to high-quality paper print is pretty mesmerising on its own, and good enough for me. But there will also be a lot more text in this book, along with case studies: personal process dissections accompanied by behind-the-scene images from the secret archive. I also designed the green slipcase design for the limited edition based on various elements from my creative journey, linked together like a circuit board. I am very pleased with that one."

Volume is a curated, bespoke publishing platform founded in 2017 by Lucas Dietrich and Darren Wall (publisher and art director, editor respectively), that enables high-quality illustrated books on visual culture, spanning across the realms of art, design, photography, fashion, architecture, and popular culture. These are books presented through fixed-time, crowd-funding campaigns and as limited editions.

From tearing electronics apart to understand their insides as a youngster to marrying objects with unforeseen functionalities and aesthetics as an adult, Hultén’s passion is apparent, begetting attractive, spirited alternatives to contemporary appliances. Throughout his range of projects, there is a curiosity-inducing quality so deep and consistent that when you get the chance to see it collated, you inch closer to comprehending the extent of Hultén’s inimitable creative process—which is precisely what Apparatrum promises and entices with.

Know more about the crowdfunding campaign for Apparatrum by Love Hultén here.