OOoo Chair by Decker Yeadon

Thanks to inhabitat.com for drawing our attention to this ingenious product – a product that is not only the ultimate example of minimal resource furniture design but is also further evidence that designers should stop trying to be clever and start focusing on the problem and let form follow function.

Need a chair?
Cut two holes in the floor.
Genius.
Who doesn’t like dangling their legs over the edge of a pier or bridge.
But who cuts holes in their floor/digs holes in their garden?

Naturally it is not so simple, nor as simple as OOoo chair creators Decker Yeadon portray in their project description.
However in principle it is great.

We particularly like the idea of using the space between supporting girders as “leg room” and can well imagine such working excellently in a museum, gallery or cinema. The legs of those of the third floor dangling above the heads of those on the second….

Where we do see a little necessary product development, however, is with the “seat”.
No one sits comfortably for long periods with a 90 degree knee angle. However if architects can build slight slopes into the floor next to the leg holes, then it should be possible to create a space where people can sit and relax for longer periods.
On a balcony of a summers evening with your feet dangling free below you…. gorgeous.

OOoo Chair by Decker Yeadon
Genius!

OOoo Chair by Decker Yeadon

OOoo Chair by Decker Yeadon between girders ... our favourite constellation

Smile Stool by studio hindia

Thanks to designspotter for spotting this design.

Although it may not look like it Smile Stool by studio hindia is the antithesis of all the horrendous wooden furniture Malaysia and Indonesia insist on sending to Europe.

Although unmistakably Indonesian in appearance Smile Stool is made from reclaimed teak combined with metal rods: and so is created from the waste the rest of the Indonesian timber and furniture industry creates.

Wonderful.

However with its unmistakable overtones of Sori Yanagi’s Butterfly Stool and Charles and Ray Eames early bent plywood work, Smile stool is much more than just as a timber waste solution.

It looks great.
And that drawer under the seat is the final touch of genius that makes Smile stool, without doubt the finest piece of Indonesian design we’ve seen this year.

Smile Stool by studio hindia

Great!

Smile stool by studio hindia

Smile stool by studio hindia ... construction process

Recycled Chair by bookhou

As any fool know one of the great revolutions in furniture design came when Charles Eames started moulding plywood – think great vowel shift, just a couple of centuries later. Since then moulding plywood has become one of the first processes designers learn and in every industrial design students notebook we can guarantee there is at least one sketch that borrows heavily on Eames’s DCW.
Which is OK, the DCW is a fantastic piece of work.

What we like about the recycled chair by bookhou is its Eamsien finesse, but that it is formed from real, non-moulded plywood, wood.

Similar to the JWC – Just Wood Chair by Florian Hauswirth.

Just better.

The geometry of the chair is just dreamy and we can well imagine that regardless of where you use it,  it must improve the overall aesthetic

Now bookhou insist on their website that the chiar is a prototype and not for sale – but that’s daft.

Such a well conceived and well executed deisgn needs to be made available for the public.

Those of you in or near Canada can see more from bookhou at CUT/COPY/PASTE at The Royal Ontario Museum or the Spring One of a Kind Show, Toronto.

Recycled Chair by bookhou

Too good for the prototype cupboard!

Recycled Chair by bookhou

Magno Wooden Radio

What with the weather being as it is we’re spending a lot of time at home relaxing.

Which on the one hand means catching up with a lot of good design blogs, and secondly listening to music.

And so we couldn’t believe our raw-red eyes when we read Fi the Imaginator‘s post on the Magno wooden radios.

Handmade, sustainable and state-of-the-art. And through the socially responsible production process a financial aid to those rural communities in Indonesia who produce the radios.

And they look fantastic and are available in three different versions.

We’re fairly certain they are not the first wooden radios on the market, but as far as we are aware they are the first where not only the  design of the radio, but also the design of the production process have been so carefully and responsibly considered.

More information can be found at Magno.

Table wooden radio WR03-RECT/4B from Magno