What makes a purchase “worth it”? The answer is different for everybody, so we’re asking some of the coolest, most shopping-savvy people we know—from small-business owners to designers, artists, and actors—to tell us the story behind one of their most prized possessions.
Who?
Lorien Stern is the artist behind Instagram’s favorite quirky, colorful ceramics. She crafts strawberry-patterned ghosts, spotted frog heads, and flower-covered snakes, which she sells alongside equally playful home goods and clothing in her popular online shop. And she does it all from her family’s salvage yard in the middle of California’s Mojave Desert. “My partner Dave and I moved out here about 10 years ago and fixed up a very rundown single-wide trailer,” she shares. “I think it used to have goats and chickens living in it.”
Relocating to this remote destination a decade ago allowed Lorien to launch her successful solo career with minimal overhead costs. Now, the creative is building her dream house and studio on her own nearby property that she purchased back in 2017. Once construction is complete, she’ll undoubtedly bring along her most treasured items, including a miniature shark coffin she commissioned from Ghanaian artist Paa Joe. “I make a lot of shark art, so I thought it’d be fun to get a shark,” she says.
What?
At first glance, the little shark-shaped coffin appears to be just a fun tchotchke. It’s made of carved wood, it’s painted yellow with red polka dots, and it’s attached to a blue pedestal, so it looks as if it’s swimming through the air. But it’s actually a tiny version of the human-size “fantasy” coffins that Paa Joe and the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop create for those who have passed. “They’re not your traditional coffins,” Lorien says. “I think their practice is, if you raised chickens, you would get buried in the giant chicken coffin, or if you sold cell phones, you’d get buried in the giant cell phone coffin.”
The coffins represent the way this African community views death, with joy rather than misery. That sentiment resonated deeply with Lorien, which is why she had to have one. “I would’ve gotten a human-size coffin if I had had the space at the time, but I settled for a small one,” she reveals. “I just really like how they deal with death. It makes it seem so fun and celebratory, whereas in our culture and in my personal experience with losing loved ones, it’s so bleak.”
When?
Lorien first discovered the Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop while she was in college. She was so obsessed with their unusual coffins that she wrote a report on them and applied for a grant to travel to Ghana and work as their apprentice—but she didn’t win the money. Years later, in 2018, Lorien came across Paa Joe’s Instagram account and saw the miniature coffins. She promptly ordered a custom one. “I was between the shark and an albino alligator,” she remembers. “I’d seen some full-size alligator coffins they had done in the past that were so cool. And I’d love a light yellow alligator.”
Where?
The small yellow-and-red shark coffin moves between the top of the dresser in her guest room and the built-in cubby in her hallway, depending on her mood. It’s more frequently found in the cubby, though, which serves as “an altar of sorts to family members who have passed away.” There, the coffin is accompanied by sentimental objects like urns and “little eggs that I like to draw portraits of deceased family members on with Ukrainian egg method,” she adds.
