The only way to correctly assemble Ikea furniture? Under the influence. Let’s be honest — it can’t make it any harder than it already is, and at the very least, it’ll make it a hell of a lot more entertaining. But if you don’t want to embark upon this potentially dangerous and, frankly, illegal journey yourself, now you can live vicariously through Giancarlo and Nicole, who are the latest stars of your new favorite web series — Hikea.
The show itself is the brainchild of two absolutely brilliant and slightly bonkers copywriters, who met at BBDO New York a number of years ago. One day, after commiserating about the virtual impossibility of building furniture from pictures either drawn by or meant for elementary school children, Hunter Fine and Alex Taylor decided to create a video series that involves strangers going on camera, taking psychedelic drugs, and building furniture.
They’ve been recruiting participants by way of Craiglist ads, Taylor told AdFreak. “We put an ad on Craigslist a year ago, and it turned out that a lot people wanted to do it. We had to sift through the applicants and determine who wasn’t dangerous.”
Once they had the talent, the rest was easy — they simply went to the homes of their volunteer stars and got to filming. “We wanted to make it look professional, so we put the crew together, shot one video, did initial edits and eventually shot another one,” Fine said. “Most of the past year was spent editing and making it right.”
And boy, did they ever make it right.
We won’t give too much away because this web series is one that you need to watch to fully appreciate, but it’s pretty safe to say that Taylor’s goal of entertaining people was met with resounding success.
“Building Ikea furniture may be the only chance most of us get to take the tools out of the closet and actually build something,” Taylor said. “We’re not carpenters or builders, so it can go a lot of different ways. But it’s something we all know; many people have built their desks after drinking a few beers or smoking a joint, and this is just the next step.”
