West Oakland, CA · Est. 2012 · Home & Lifestyle
Luvhaus
Handmade ceramics for everyday life
Their story
There is a specific feeling you get when you drink coffee from a cup that a human made. The weight is slightly off. The lip isn’t perfectly even. The glaze catches light in a way that a mold could never replicate. That feeling is what Luvhaus is about.
Shawn Kam founded Luvhaus in 2012 in West Oakland. His love of ceramics started as a teenager, apprenticing in 17th century American earthenware at a small production studio in Maine. Luvhaus is the long result of that — a place to channel a decades-long understanding of craft and form into something functional and lasting.
The studio occupies a building in West Oakland that has housed ceramic and glass kilns since the 1970s, when a family of artists bought what had once been a Bay Area cannery and turned it into a workspace. Shawn leads a small team there, focused on elevating functional design through time-honored craft.
Every piece is thrown on the wheel, refined, and finished by hand. The imperfections aren’t a design choice — they’re evidence that a human made this. Luvhaus has no interest in making things that look like they came from a factory. They’re making things that look like they came from a person, because they did.
Why Obvious loves them
Someone on our team ordered a set of Luvhaus mugs and we have spent considerable time since then thinking about why they’re so satisfying. The answer is that they feel made. Not assembled, not produced — made. There’s an intention in every piece that you can feel when you hold it.
We love businesses that have a relationship with their materials. Shawn knows his clay. He knows his studio. He knows what that specific combination produces. That kind of knowledge is a competitive moat that no software can replicate — but software can give him more time to use it.
Why their story inspired us
There is a specific feeling you get when you drink coffee from a cup that a human made. The weight is slightly off. The lip isn’t perfectly even. The glaze catches light in a way that a mold could never replicate. That feeling is what Luvhaus is about.
Shawn Kam founded Luvhaus in 2012 in West Oakland. His love of ceramics started as a teenager, apprenticing in 17th century American earthenware at a small production studio in Maine. Luvhaus is the long result of that — a place to channel a decades-long understanding of craft and form into something functional and lasting.
The studio occupies a building in West Oakland that has housed ceramic and glass kilns since the 1970s, when a family of artists bought what had once been a Bay Area cannery and turned it into a workspace. Shawn leads a small team there, focused on elevating functional design through time-honored craft.
Know a business like Luvhaus?
The best nominations come from people who use the product and love it. Tell us about a maker who should be in this program.