Regina man's unique furniture gains worldwide popularity

Big time furniture and design craftsman Jeremy Rieger is making a name for himself in Regina.

He became known for making furniture shaped like Nintendo consoles and controllers that were four times the size of the real machine.
 
Rieger told Gormley on Friday that he made the first one a little over a year ago, adding that it wasn’t the first thing he tried to make.
 
“The first product that I still get asked to make now is a Lego lamp,” he said. “It looks like a Lego mini figure, and I made it for my son for his birthday one year, got a lot of compliments on it and a lot of people said ‘you should make more of these’ and so I made a bunch more of them and sold them.”
 
The idea of the Nintendo console as a coffee table came from a photo he saw online. Rieger thought he would take on the challenge and he’s happy he did as it’s been a huge success.
 
“The first one I made I just put it on Facebook just to kind of show what I can do and it just got a lot of interest in it,” he said. “People were sharing the post and it built some momentum so I thought I would put it on Kijiji and see if anyone wants to buy it.”
 
About an hour after he posted the ad to sell the coffee table he said someone emailed him asking to come see it in person.
 
“The two guys come over and the one says to me, ‘I brought my friend over because I just wasn’t really sure if this was for real, I actually thought that you Photoshopped something’, but he was pleasantly surprised when he saw it was the real thing.”
 
Rieger said business has since taken off. He’s had interest from all over the world, including the United States and Europe, from people wanting to purchase the furniture.
 
—With files from Gormley