Furniture for Life

Tejo Remy may not be a name that immediately springs to mind when it comes to, well… anything, unless you’re really into obscure Dutch furniture designers.

You’re more likely to have heard of Droog Design, who are a loose collection of Dutch designers, who use the name to publicize their individual works. Most of which are fairly off-the-wall, limited edition, ecologically friendly and semi-useful works of art.

My particular favourite is the ‘You Can’t Lay Down Your Memory’ Chest of Drawers by the aforementioned Tejo Remy. It’s a simple and effective out of the box take on the chest of drawers theme that I’ve not seen anywhere else.

A limited run of 200 chests were made in 1991, each a collection of random drawers, found by the designer himself, and held together with an industrial strength packing belt. The one I have shown in the images is number 95.

Due to the fact that they are all reclaimed drawers, and they’re all hand built, not one of them is the same. You are definitely assured of exclusivity. However, as always, exclusivity comes at a price, and if you’re lucky enough to find one for sale you won’t get a lot of change from £20,000!

The creditability has been boosted as one of them is one now in permanent residency in the US museum of modern art since their 1996 exhibition ‘Contemporary Design from the Netherlands’.

So if you’ve got 20 grand lying about and you’re fed up with the way you’re storing your socks at the moment, you could do a lot worse than searching out one of these masterpieces.

Whilst there seems to be a big push to whip up some sort of Ashes fever at the moment, it seems after two days of the first test match that we are setting ourselves up for a fall. I believe that there is another sport that should be getting more of our attention: cycling.

We have a plethora of Olympic champions, three of which are competing in this year’s Tour de France, and all of them are in with a good chance of taking one of the coveted jerseys or at least a stage win or two.

As such I have found something relevant to interior design that may inspire you to search the gutter end of the freeview channels this evening, and for the next fortnight.

Mark Cavendish, Bradley Wiggins, Lance Armstrong and the crew must all have at least two things in common after a long day in the saddle – spare bits of bike that are to be replaced, and sore bottoms! Whilst I don’t have a solution for their posterior pains, I do have an outlet for their unwanted bike bits: the new range from Bike Furniture Design.

Designer Andy Gregg has recycled parts from old bikes (as well as trains and automobiles) to produce a line of contemporary furniture.

Using wheels and tyres and a lot of imagination, he has created some surprisingly stylish tables and chairs. 

If you have an old bike in the shed that you can’t be bothered to take to the tip, why not have it turned into a coffee table?

I have been very good thus far in this post not to use the obvious pun, but I cannot resist any longer: Get on your bike and go reCYCLEing!

Good luck to all the Brits in the Tour de France (and the England Ashes squad too).

LED technology is now lighting up our world. For years the humble light emitting diode was only used for displays on video recorders, early digital watches and the bits that flash when the panel in Data’s head is opened (Star Trek, The Next Generation). Whilst all of these applications were invaluable to the human race, the LED’s were never bright enough to do much more.

Recent years, however, have seen an exponential development in the development of LED’s and you can now see them in traffic lights and on those funny looking bits under Audi headlights.

There are two advantages to LED’s; firstly, they a extremely efficient which means that they are environmentally friendly, and secondly, they run cool. This is a big boon when putting them in domestic equipment as it means they are safe to touch, unlike light bulbs (as I’m sure we’re all aware – who amongst us hasn’t burnt themselves whilst changing a bulb or lamp shade?).

Anyway, the reason I’m twittering on about this is that LED technology is now becoming a big thing in home furnishings. At first we saw LED Christmas tree lights, but now LED’s are finding there way into more exciting items, such as these twist together LED blocks by innovative design company Glide.

Each block is a different colour and can be, as the name suggests, twisted together to make sculptures of your own design, and there are no limits to how many can be linked. Just like large illuminated Lego blocks! 

When they first came out you got the obligatory smiley faces, and then some Damien Hirst style dotted walls, but it was only a matter of time before somebody was truly creative. This is the best we’ve seen so far: The Tree of Light.

Created for the Museum of Modern Art and spotted in a Manhattan store, this dazzling, psychedelic tree, is complete with branches peeking from within its fluorescent yellow and green crown.

What better way to liven up your room of wood furniture? If you’re feeling a little less ambitious you could just make up something smaller at first. Due to the high efficiency and low heat emissions, these blocks are ideal as nightlights on a piece of children’s bedroom furniture or on a landing so you don’t walk into things on the way to the bathroom at night!

Ever been watching telly in the evening and it’s turned from dusk to dark whilst you’ve been sitting there watching re-runs of Grand Designs or getting frustrated with another awful makeover by Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen on Changing Rooms? Have you then flick the television off before getting up and finding that it’s pitch black and before you know it you’re tripping over your footstool and cursing?

Or is that just me?

Any way, there is now a funky and stylish solution to this perennial problem: glow in the dark furniture! How cool is that?!

Now, this is not the same glow in the dark stuff that you find on your watch face or the chemical mix in glow sticks, they are powered by electricity. However, they don’t get hot and they don’t drawer huge amounts of power. The secret is in the material used in construction.

This padded furniture is made up of a packaging product known as ‘air ravioli’, which is completely transparent pockets of air, providing both comfort and light diffusion (meaning that you don’t get beams of light, just a relaxing glow. This is further augmented by the careful positioning of different shapes of air ravioli to create various effects. 

The whole unit is then covered in a semi transparent cloth known as ‘Via Lattea’ (translates as Milky Way, which is the name of an Italian ski resort near to where the furniture is made.

The insurance that this range is of the highest quality is that the design is by Mario Bellini.

There are no prices available at the moment, but judging by the designer label and the technology involved, I would start saving now!

London Print (Click for Bigger)

No, this isn’t a special announcement by the London tourist board, nor is it a vote capturing policy by UKIP, it’s a far more important announcement (well, for us in the interior design game anyway!)

There is a trend for designer children’s decoration in mainland Europe at the moment. It’s nothing new, children’s decoration has been far more stylish in the rest of Europe than here in the UK, but a lot of it is wasted on our formative ones. However, one designer company has it spot on – Famile.

Famile are a husband and wife partnership with an interest in children’s room design. Julie, who is French, and Simon, an Englishman (with inspiration from their daughter, Ophelia). As you can imagine from our cultural history there is always the possibility of a little nationalism and some competition in the Anglo-French household. As such, their latest creations are bipolar, yet complimentary.

They have produced hand drawn fun maps of their respective capital cities that they have turned into posters. They are not to scale, but these are not for geography lessons. They do, however, have all the major landmarks (The London Eye, The Gherkin Building, The Houses of Parliament, etc., in London and the Eiffel Tower and The Bastille in Paris, for example). Printed on high quality 250g paper, they measure 42cm x 59.4 cm and come unframed.

We’re wondering if they are just too good to hang in a child’s room, because they would grace any lively room in the house.

Anyway, unsurprisingly (for an English woman) at the time of writing the London map is proving the most popular, but with the same amount of each in this limited run, like the perenial competition between oak furniture and pine furniture, there is never going to be a real winner.

Paris Print (Click for Bigger)

There has been some good and bad news about the London Furniture Show.

The bad news: originally planned for this year, the organisers have been hit by several setbacks and has been cancelled, the economic conditions being only one of the few reasons given (the credit crunch is hitting us all).

The good news: They have been able to rearrange it! Running from 25th May to 27th May 2010 this is due to be a big event attracting a lot of interest from many of the world’s most famous designers, as well as the more affordable end of the market.

It may be over a year away, but if you’re saving up for a big project that you may be starting in a year or so we would recommend putting a reminder on your mobile phone now!

However, if you can’t wait that long, why not get down to the Manchester Furniture Show?  The show will be on between 19th July to 22nd July 2009, at the Manchester International Convention Centre and GMEX.  Well worth a visit, you may even bump in to us (but don’t let that put you off)!

Shows are always a great way of getting inspiration and actualy being able to try out all the furniture you like in one place without any obligation to buy.

Some people have the image of a rocking chair that it’s just a place for a great-grandma to sit in the corner, rug over her lap watching Countdown on the TV.  Well, that’s a seriously outdated opinion.

When was the last time you sat in a rocking chair?  If it was a while a go then you may not remember how comfortable they actually are.  I was in a designer boutique in Cardiff the other day and I was surprised to see a rocking chair in the corner.  This is pricisely because of the preconceptions I had of Granny!  The chair they had was designed by Miri Mizrahi.  I have included a couple of pictures below.

As you can see, this isn’t your average rocker, but it’s beautiful and remarkably comfortable.  Just what I demand from a chair!

This got me thinking. If an up and coming designer such as Miri Mizrahi (she was recently featured in Interior Design magazine and the New York Times) is designing rocking chairs, then maybe we’re missing a trick.  The owner of the aformentioned shop gave me some information on a few other designs which I have since looked at, along with looking into the history of the rocking chair.

The original design is said to have been created by the late US president Benjamin Franklin when he simply attached two curved pieces of wood to the bottom of one of his dining chairs.  History doesn’t reclall what his wife said when she found out what he’d done to the presidential dining set! This basic design lasted for decades before any real attempt to make something more contemporary.

Modern furniture design can often live happily in a boutique but not in an every day home, and I have to save that a lot of the rocking chairs I found fell into the former category, but the office rocker (left) seems like a great idea to stop people leaning back on their normal office chairs and risking breaking their backs.

The odd blue thing (right) is actually made out of the same material as a snowboard, which makes it light, flexible and funky - ideal for a teenager’s bedroom - and it’s easy to shove in the loft when you don’t need it.

So, put aside your preconceptions about the rocking chair and consider one as a bit of fun for your home.

Bunk beds can be a great way of making a small room more spacious.  They can also be great fun a a kid.  I remember always wanting one when I was a nipper, but I had to have my brother’s old bed.  I’m not sure I’ve ever got over it ;o)

Anyway, enough of my childhood torture.  Where was I?  Oh yes, making more of a small room.  Well, Argington have gone a stage further with their Uffizi bunk bed (above).  With a name like that you would expect it to be a work of art (it is named after the Uffizi gallery in Italy). Whilst it’s certainly innovative, I wouldn’t go as far as immortalising it in such an iconic place!

What’s so great about it is that it is truly multipurpose.  It has a bed on top (as expected!),  but it also has a small double bed underneath as well.  Then on one end there is a sort of TV unit, whilst at the other end is a computer desk and bookshelf.  It really does squeeze a lot into a small space.

Should you not want to use the double bed at all times then its is removable and various other pieces can be packed away too.  The company have really thought this one through.

Argington specialise in designing furniture for children and have a full range of modern furniture that is produced in an environmentally friendly way in an effort to cater for the world the children that use their furniture will inhabit in the future. Very commendable!

Isamu Noguchi may be a little difficult to get your tongue around, but if you’re interested in modern furniture classics then it’s well worth it.

Born on November 17th, 1904 in Los Angeles he is known primarily as an architect and landscape designer, Isamu Noguchi turned his hand to furniture design and came up with several modern furniture classics, the most famous of these being his ‘rudder’ table.  This uses one wooden rudder shaped leg in conjunction with two tubular metal legs to support a rounded-off triangular top – sometime made of wood, sometimes glass, depending on the specification.

This was not his only venture into the field of furniture.  Highly influenced by geometric shapes, he came up with a series of tables, stools and other sculptural and stylised pieces that seamlessly blended Japanese influences with the metropolitan chic of the New York arts movement.

By teaming up with both the Herman Miller Furniture Company and Knoll Associates in 1948, he managed to get his furniture into the marketplace and out into the public eye, where it was received with open arms.

As with all pioneering designers, the original pieces are now in private collections or museums (one of which being the Noguchi Museum in New York).  However, there are many imitation pieces out there.  The trouble is that you get what you pay for, and if you want something of high quality yet practical you will have to have a deep wallet, or be very fortunate to find something in a furniture sale.

There has been a trend recently to put the letter ‘i’ before the name of your product and jump on the Apple bandwagon.  I suppose at one point it was a crafty and pretty effective marketing tool.  Unfortunately the world has now become flooded with products that just don’t deserve the ‘i’ prefix.

What next, the iPhone?

Damn, someone beat me to that as well… However, in the world of furniture there have been a few attempts at making a multimedia chair.

The best of which is touting itself as the iChair.  It takes the design ethic of Apple by merging practicality with a funky design.

The iChair

Granted, it may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but I reckon they’ve made a really good fist of things here.  Other designers have put the speakers in the wrong places (in the arms, or facing forwards), but these are at ear height and aren’t too close to your head, plus there’s one under your bum for bass! Other features include a padded pocket for your iPod and a supurb mock-suede finish.

On the flip side, below you can see the Musical Chair by Matthew Audio.

The Musical Chair

It’s actually not very clear on the web site whether this is a functioning loudspeaker, or if it’s just for show. I’m certain that us ladies would be more interested in listening to bass-heavy music if we did own a functioning one of these ;o)  It would make Sunday lunch a bit more interesting anyway!

So there you have it.  Some more cool modern furniture for the ultra-modern home.  Makes a difference from wood furniture, even if it’s not entirely practical.