Loveland furniture business combines modern, industrial with furniture designs

While pursuing a degree in architecture, Justin Real had an epiphany.

“When it was getting close to time to graduation, I realized how much I hated it,” he said. “I was just going to be stuck working under someone, or for someone, and I’ve never done well that way. ... “I just knew it wasn’t for me,” he said.

Now, Real is combining his love of construction and materials in his Loveland business Real Industrial Edge Furniture.

The business specializes in designing and fabricating custom furnishings, both for residential homes and commercial buildings.

“I’ve always built and been involved with motorcycles and cars,” Real said. “ … To me, this was a way to combine it. I love materials and construction … overall architecture, the way things are done, bridges and skyscrapers, it’s amazing to me, really interesting. In my mind I combined that whole world with the artistry of motorcycles.”

DEVELOPMENT: $500M shopping, fun center planned for Loveland

The result has been a blend of creative, modern and industrial pieces that have attracted interest around the country.

“The majority of the time I work with architects and designers,” he said. “They come up with crazy ideas, and we collaborate on them to bring it down to something that’s doable.”

Real and his wife, Allison, moved to Loveland from Oklahoma almost on a whim, relocating in a matter of two weeks after visiting Allison’s mother.

Shortly thereafter, Real Industrial Edge started to come together.

“I’d built a few things in Oklahoma that got me thinking about it,” Real  said. “There was an art show there with furniture or useful objects made from everyday or unusual materials. People made furniture out of things I’d never thought of. It made me think about the ideas that I had.”

So he built an end table of out materials he’d found in the house that they’d moved into.

“We didn’t have any money,” Real said. “It was all these old telephone beams. I bundled them up, welded straps around them and sanded it to death. I put it on Etsy and I sold it overnight.”

He said he probably lost money on the table, but it was OK because he wanted sales and reviews under his belt. He took the money and put it back into materials. By the end of 2010, he’d been contacted by Starbucks. He now has products in 15 Starbucks locations, though the closest, he said, are in Texas and Nevada.

Almost all of the products are shipped elsewhere, though he recently created a tasting bar for Boulder Brands products.

DRIVE-THUR: Dutch Bros. Coffee set for Loveland launch

Real occasionally does individual work and sometimes has things ready to sell and ship immediately on online shops like Etsy, Custom Made and Houzz.

“I want to have fun. The goal is to have fun and make a living, not grind out the same thing.”

Much like the blending of architecture and motorcycles into a business, another project is underway for the Reals. They’re planning a downtown Loveland coffee shop that will include their RIEF furniture.

Dark Heart Coffee Bar is about four months away from opening, Real said.

“That’s a big passion of ours,” he said. “We want to put our stamp, our style, on a coffee shop. It’s specialty coffee … It’s something that isn’t available in Loveland yet. Ours is going to be very different.”

But Real Industrial Edge Furniture isn’t going anywhere.

“This is what I love,” he said. “We want to run a (coffee shop) business in our style. I don’t have dreams of serving coffee everyday for the rest of my life, although I do love coffee shops and the atmosphere. That’s what we’re used to doing, building out environments like that.”