Revving up design from the scrap heap

Shasta Smith is not your typical grease monkey. Shes an interior designer who also happens to have a thing for vintage motorcycles.

She rides them, she collects them, she mines them for inspiration. She parks her street-legal 1972 Honda racing bike next to her desk.

In fact, anything with wheels kicks her mental motor into high gear. She sees the beauty inside cast-off metal and finds a home indoors for what once was scrapyard junk.

I have two types of clientele, she said. Ive been a full-time interior designer in Sacramento (Calif.) for 15 years, but I also have another type of customer people who want motorcycle design. That has international appeal.

With her distinctive red mane, Smith has attracted a worldwide audience for her design firm, The Vintage Monkey. Shes worked on designs for popular home-improvement TV shows such as House Crashers. In February, her work also was showcased during a New York launch party for a new cable channel, FYI, devoted to creative design. Yet Smith remains mostly anonymous in her hometown of Sacramento.

People are always surprised to find our studio, she said. They say, We had no idea!

When they come through (the studio), their first impression is its a motorcycle shop, she added. But then they realize, no, its something else, something pretty cool.

A 2,000-square-foot garage in Sacramentos industrial area just north of downtown is home to Smiths Vintage Monkey studio and workshop. Elmer, the shop cat, keeps a watchful eye.

The walls, floor and ceiling are lined with projects, several in progress. Almost everything started out as something else.

Im always on the hunt for vintage salvage, Smith said. Then, we create architectural elements based on those findings. We hate throwing anything away.

Read more:
Revving up design from the scrap heap