The Steltman chair by twentieth century Dutch architect and designer Gerrit Rietveld has been reissued by furniture brand Rietveld Originals to mark the iconic design’s fiftieth anniversary.
Rietveld Originals produced 100 limited editions of the chair, first designed in 1963 as a symmetrical pair for the Steltman jewellery house in The Hague.
Reissued Steltman chair (also main image)
Released at the end of last year, the chair was reproduced using the original drawings and one of the two original chairs, currently on display at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum.
The design is broken up into three simple shapes that appear to rest up against and on top of each other. These sections are all upholstered in leather, the original material used to cover the chair.
Original chairs in the Steltman jewellery store
Fifty dark grey chairs have the single arm on the right and the fifty white models are a mirror image.
Gerrit Rietveld was a principle member of the De Stijl modernist movement in the Netherlands during the early twentieth century.
Cologne 2014: Denmark design duo GamFratesi has combined a coffee table and pouffe to create footstools with integrated trays for French brand Ligne Roset (+ slideshow).
Trouf, a cross between a tray and a pouffe, was designed by GamFratesi with both hard and soft surfaces as a multi-functional piece of furniture.
“We wanted to join different functions just combining soft and hard surfaces, and create furniture where the different objects or moods find their place informally,” Enrico Fratesi told Dezeen.
Wooden trays for holding food or drinks are set into the upholstered tops, offset so a fabric section at one end can be used for laptops, books or resting feet.
Rounded edges were designed so sharp corners wouldn’t cause any issues when walking past. “It seemed correct to have a rounded shape,” said Fratesi. “Since the position of the furniture is in front of a sofa or a lounge chair, we wanted to facilitate the passage between sitting and pouf – avoiding any kind of angle and the rigid part.”
A palette of pastel colours was chosen for the fabric coverings, though these can be customised to match or stand out against the users’ existing furniture.
“The colours that we have selected for these models are soft and nearly muted, but in fact the pouf can be upholstered with very different fabrics and colours so that can be in combination or contrast with the seat in front,” Fratesi explained.
The surfaces are slightly raised on small white wooden legs. The trays are available in natural oak or stained the colour of anthracite, and can be removed along with the upholstery for cleaning.
Trouf is on display at Ligne Roset‘s stand located in Hall 11.3 at imm cologne until Sunday. It will also be shown at Maison&Objet outside Paris from 24 to 28 January.
News: a storage rail based on a traditional Shaker-style peg board, a scaly room divider and a magnetic lamp were revealed as the winners of the [D3] Contest for young designers at the imm cologne trade fair today.
Ordnungshaber wedge hook border by Christoph Goechnahts
This year the [D3] Contest first prize was awarded to Swiss designer Christoph Goechnahts for his Ordnungshaber storage system – a reinterpretation of the peg rails common to furniture made by members of the Shaker religious sect in 1800s America.
Ordnungshaber wedge hook border by Christoph Goechnahts
Wedge-shaped pegs slot into niches spaced along wall-mounted wooden rails.
Ordnungshaber wedge hook border by Christoph Goechnahts
The wedge hook border is designed to run around the perimeter of a room and can also accommodate removable shelves.
Reverso scaly room divider by Yann Mathys
In second place was Swiss designer Yann Mathys’ Reverso room divider featuring synthetic paper scales made of Tyvek, a lightweight material produced from plastic fibres, with one side shinier than the other. These tiles can be flipped by dragging a hand over the surface to create patterns across the screen.
Jella magnetic lamp by Lena Schlumbohm
The magnetic Jella lamp by German designer Lena Schlumbohm was given third prize. The desk lamp comprises a light source at one end of a pastel-coloured magnetic wand, which can be placed on any of the metal base’s angled faces.
The [D3] Contest awards prototype designs by up-and-coming designers as part of imm cologne each year.
Twenty-two nominated projects are currently display in Hall 1 of the Koelnmesse exhibition venue as part of the event, which continues until Sunday 19 January.
British designer Tom Dixon will show his latest range of brass home accessories based on cogs at the Maison&Objet trade fair later this month.
Tom Dixon has designed two collections of brass items for the home. His Cog collection references industrial machine parts and tools.
“As we scour factories worldwide, we find ourselves constantly referring to great British engineering,” said Dixon. “Creating a sense of the tooled and the machined, these pieces are formed in brass-plated solid aluminium.”
The range features candle holders in two sizes, cone and cylinder-shaped tea light holders, different sized trinket boxes, a candelabra and a desk tidy.
Sections of each item have been turned on a lathe to create a diamond-shaped pattern, a process known as knurling, to create a better surface for gripping.
The Arc collection contains a two-piece trivet, a bottle opener and a corkscrew, all created in solid brass using a sand-casting process. Dixon called them “science fiction-inspired futuristic simplicity combined with practical shapes that are easy to use.”
A four-point star can be removed from the centre of the circular trivet so the elements can be used to protect table surfaces from hot or wet cooking utensils.
The bottle opener and corkscrew both have curved tops and embossed edges.
These new products will be exhibited at the Maison&Objet trade fair outside Paris from 24-28 January.
East London design brand Hulger has launched a second design for its award-winning Plumen low-energy lightbulbs.
The Plumen 002 produces a softer light than the original design that’s more suited to ambient lighting.
Like the original Plumen design, which won Design of the Year when it launched three years ago, the new product is a compact fluorescent bulb that replaces the usual prongs and whirls of a standard energy efficient bulb with a sculptural shape that means it looks attractive in light fittings where the naked bulb is left on display.
Whereas the first Plumen bulb was created by drawing with looping tubes of glass, this new design involved shaping the form of the fluorescent tube itself.
The sculpted tube takes on the profile of a traditional light bulb from some angles but the form has been cut away and pierced to leave swooping curves, straight edges when viewed from the side and a oblong void in the middle.
“The geometry of the Plumen 002 creates interesting resonances in the square and oblong spaces they will usually inhabit,” said Hulger founder, creative director and designer Nicolas Roope. “The effect is particularly strong when used in series and when played off against walls and surfaces.”
The concept was to blow the glass tube like a bottle, which still maintaing the loop required for the technology to function. “This approach hadn’t been done in any mainstream bulbs before, but the team believed it was plausible,” said the designers, who enlisted the help of Texan neon sculptor Tony Greer to advise on the different lighting effects and intensities that various shapes would achieve.
“We looked for the right balance between an integrated and disintegrated construction, between organic and geometric form, something that would present a certain dynamic while remaining gentle,” said designer Bertrand Clerc.
“The work of modern sculptor Barbara Hepworth really helped us in creating an interesting relation between this hollow space and the surface of the outer body,” he added. “The transfer between these two elements also establishes an elegant connection between the rather contemporary inner silhouette, and the more traditional appearance of the outer silhouette.”
The new design is a 7W bulb giving off the equivalent of a 30W incandescent light source and the low brightness means it doesn’t need shading.
They also hinted that an LED Plumen bulb could be on the way.
Hulger created its first series of sculptural low-energy bulb prototypes in 2007, coinciding with the phasing out of inefficient incandescent light bulbs and aiming to reinvent the ugly compact fluorescent lamps as a beautiful product.
Maritime gas lamps were used as a reference for these pendant lights created by Danish studio Space Copenhagen for design brand &tradition.
To create the Copenhagen Pendant, Space Copenhagen modernised the form of the old lamps once used to illuminate the Danish capital’s piers.
The studio’s design for Danish company &tradition consists of a lacquered metal shade, which is clamped to the cord with four arching plated steel tabs where the curving shape narrows at the top.
“The starting point was to create a design that would allow us to use various metals, but also that the design works from a purely sculptural point of view, with a monochrome finish,” said Space Copenhagen founding partner Peter Bundgaard Rützou. “Depending on the purpose and space it’s used in, the lamp can do both.”
Light is directed downward through a wide hole in the base of the shade.
“The pendant is widest in the middle and narrows at the open top and bottom to ensure that the lamp has a substantial body, while still protecting you from looking directly into the light,” said the studio’s second partner Signe Bindslev Henriksen.
The lamps are available in three sizes and five matte colours. The two smaller designs are made from steel and the larger model is formed from aluminium.
&tradition launches the Copenhagen Pendant light by Space Copenhagen
In their second collaboration, following the success of the Fly lounge series, &tradition collaborates with Space Copenhagen on a new elegant pendant light.
“We are very pleased to be working with Space Copenhagen again,” says Martin Kornbek Hansen, the Brand Manager of &tradition. “They have an exceptional eye for detail and surface texture, and a unique way of combining the classic with the contemporary.”
An exercise in contrasts, the Copenhagen Pendant combines the classic and the modern, the maritime and the industrial. Its matte lacquered metal lampshade disperses the light in a subtle but spectacular way resembling the classic gaslight feel of the bleak Copenhagen piers.
“Over the years we have made several bespoke light pieces for our interior projects,” says Signe Bindslev Henriksen of Space Copenhagen. “So the biggest challenge in designing the Copenhagen Pendant was to meet our own expectations in making an equally sculptural and functional light.”
Originally, Space Copenhagen designed one version of the pendant, but it expanded into a series of three sizes: 200 millimetres, 350 millimetres and 600 millimetres in diameter, and five matte shades: blush, moss, slate, black and white. “The starting point was to create a design which would allow us to use various metals, but also that the design works from a purely sculptural point of view, with a monochrome finish. Depending on the purpose and space it’s used in, the lamp can do both,” says Space Copenhagen’s other founding partner, Peter Bundgaard Rützou.
The flexibility and attention to detail of the Copenhagen Pendant is a careful consideration inspired by Space Copenhagen’s experience as interior architects. Even the flow of light was carefully planned from the start. “The pendant is widest in the middle and narrows at the open top and bottom to ensure that the lamp has a substantial body, while still protecting you from looking directly into the light,” says Bindslev Henriksen. The downwards light is even and solid, while the subtle uplight is diffused, adding to the atmosphere of the ceiling.
Sketches of the lamps
“The Copenhagen Pendant is a perfect example of a classic typology of light reinvented in an innovative and contemporary way, qualities that we value highly at &tradition,” says Kornbek Hansen.
The stem of this task lamp designed by Bao-Nghi Droste forms an exaggerated loop behind the conical shade (+ slideshow).
The Round lamp by Bao-Nghi Droste of Heidelberg, Germany, has a wide shallow shade mounted at a 45 degree angle on the end of the curving steel tube.
“The gently shaped steel tube could be described as the centrepiece of the lamp because on the one hand it pictures the flow of the current all the way up from the base to the light source within the shade, and on the other hand it acts as a function-providing element,” said Droste.
He explained that the loop “provides a handle-like geometry for easily moving the lamp”, which rotates on its base.
Where the stem connects to the back of the shade, small concentric circles radiate outwards over its surface and a small amount of light is allowed to escape at the join.
“Sharp edges concentrically surround the hole as rings imaging a sort of epicenter at which the light emits,” said the designer.
An acrylic defuser covers the light source and emits a wide beam of light suitable for bedside reading or working at a desk.
Dutch designer Richard Hutten has created a conference table that can easily be converted for a game of ping pong.
The Ping Table by Richard Hutten for furniture brand Lande features a drawer in each end to contain the two white bats, balls and a detachable net that clamps onto the edges of the table top.
“In the morning you can work on it solitarily, then use if for lunch with your colleagues, or have a meeting of up to ten people, followed by a game of table tennis,” said Hutten.
“Our work is a big part of our lives and a part of who we are,” he continued. “Due to the digitalisation of society, we are always ‘on’, so it is important to take a break and have fun. Design is traditionally about solving problems. I don’t solve problems, I create possibilities.”
He explained that the product is good for body and mind because it encourages play and activity during the day. “A game of table tennis clears the mind, which eventually leads to increased productivity,” he said.
The table is made of beech and features a walnut inlay to mark out the field for table tennis, but also divides the surface into four workspaces.
The pared-back design is meant to make it suitable for residential or industrial environments. It’s made by craftsmen in the Netherlands and measures 240 by 120 centimetres.
Wire baskets cradle balls of light to create these lamps by Barcelona designer Martín Azú.
Martín Azúa‘s Light Container pendant lamps comprise black metal baskets that each hold a diffused glass lightbulb. “A mass of light inside a metallic basket seems like it is floating,” said the designer.
Suspended using invisible string, the lamps appear to be supported by the curving black electrical cord.
The black baskets tilt upwards so the rounded bulbs don’t roll out of the holes in the top.
The lamp comes in three different sizes and is part of a limited edition of five thousand units.
Here is some more information from the designer:
A mass of light inside a metallic basket seems like it is floating. Light is immaterial, but at the same time lamps are also objects. In this case we treat light as something with weight and volume. It is made in three different sizes that can be hung individually or in groups of two or three.
The glass diffuser generates a nice warm dim light with soft shadows, suitable for restaurant tables, counters, receptions, meeting and working tables. Its sculptural character allows the personalisation of singular halls, stairwells.
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