San Francisco college student transforms old skateboards into guitars

SAN FRANCISCO (KTVU) - In a San Francisco garage, a college student is building a career out of two loves: skateboards and guitars.

Nick Pourfard spent his life on a skateboard, and playing the guitar.

When an injury forced him off the board for a while, he looked for something to do with his time.

He decided he would learn to make a guitar. "I really, really wanted to make a guitar," Pourfard explained. "But didn't want to make something that I could buy." Inspiration that came was right in the garage. "I want this to be super sentimental to me, and the fact that I did skate and I had a bunch of skateboards."

He decided to make a guitar out of skateboards. "I know that once the idea came into my head, I couldn't let go of it." Pourfard learned the basics about guitar making on YouTube, the rest was trial and error.

"The whole thing is that, I don't want people to know that it's skateboards," at least not right away he explained. "There's more thought into it than it's just a skateboard guitar."

Pourfard uses anywhere between four and 44 skateboards to make one guitar. "There's no rules, so I'm doing whatever I want, and that's the coolest thing to me!"

The bright colors of the guitars come out as he crafts them. "I'll make the same guitar a thousand times, different pattern every time," Pourfard said smiling. "I think that's the coolest thing! Everyone who gets one of these is going to have a one of a kind guitar."

Pourfard's hobby now has a brand name: Prisma. The name was inspired by Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon", which has a prism on the cover with a rainbow coming out of it.

He's made more than 20 guitars. They sell for a minimum of $2,500 dollars. "I just sold one to Steve Harris from Iron Maiden," Pourfard said pointing to a signed photo of the band. "That was kind of the most epic thing to ever happen to me!"

Pourfard is still working on his college degree, but says he wants to turn his garage business into a career.

"I want this to work and I want to be serious about it, but at the same time, I don't want it to get too serious 'cause then it stops being fun," Pourfard said. "And right now, it's super fun."

Pourfard's guitars are on display and for sale through the end of March at FTC Skate Shop in San Francisco's Haight Ashbury district.