#Connected - Humble Administrator Chair & Candy Cubicle
On the occasion of London Design Festival, nine imaginative, original tables and seating designs, created by nine leading international designers are on show at the Design Museum in London until October 11th.
Episode 1: Humble Administrator Chair & Table by Studio Swine & Candy Cubicle by Sabine Marcelis.
The Connected exhibition is the result of a challenge between the designers and one of Europe’s top craft workshops during the Covid-19 crisis.
The pandemic significantly changed the way people live, interact and work, creatives and makers had to adjust their processes using new technologies to work together at a distance and often operate from new, improvised, home offices.
The American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC), Benchmark Furniture and the Design Museum challenged these designers to create a table and seating for their personal use, to suit their new ways of living and working from home.
The designers had a choice of three sustainable American hardwoods to work with – red oak, maple or cherry. They were also invited to record their creative journeys to demonstrate how they approached the brief and developed their designs at a time of limited physical contact.
This installation showcases the results of a unique experiment that sets out to push the boundaries of what is possible with these timbers and to explore how designers and craftspeople adapted their working practices during lockdown.
The project demanded that both the designers and craftspeople at Benchmark in their Berkshire workshop work innovatively, by relying solely on digital communication and video conferencing, to bring the designers’ visions to life.
The designers involved in Connected are: Ini Archibong (Switzerland), Maria Bruun (Denmark), Jaime Hayon (Spain), (UK), Heatherwick Studio (UK), Sebastian Herkner (Germany), Maria Jeglinska- Adamczewska (Poland), Sabine Marcelis (Netherlands), Studiopepe (Italy) and Studio Swine (UK / Japan).
Humble Administrator’s Chair and Table by Studio Swine (UK/Japan)
American red oak and cherry
Studio Swine designed a throne-style seat and table inspired by traditional Chinese gardens and the archetype of the Ming Chair.
After spending lockdown in Tokyo, the pair were left craving nature and wanted to celebrate the timber in its purest form. American cherry was chosen for its warmth and caramel tones for the solid seat and back leg, with curved steam bent American red oak front legs, arms and backrest.
The steam bend for the arms was ambitious and complex to fabricate, in that it bends across two axes – requiring a team of six craftspeople and a specially constructed jig to create its unusual form.
Candy Cubicle by Sabine Marcelis (Netherlands)
American maple
Sabine Marcelis’ Candy Cubicle transforms from ‘working mode’ into ‘hiding mode’ with an element of surprise on the inside – inspired by the suitcase scene in Pulp Fiction. The outer surfaces use veneered American maple with a white oil finish.
The interior has compartments for books and a computer, constructed from the same maple veneer – but coated in a yellow high-gloss translucent lacquer – hand polished to a fine finish. This offers a bright pop of colour when the cubicle is open, with the fine maple grain visible through the lacquer.
The unit is on matching yellow casters, allowing the piece to be easily closed when the working day is over. Sabine’s seat, a circular stool, is made from stacked and turned solid maple, with matching casters.
Pictures by David Cleveland.
