Hasta La Ideas

Patterns of woven natural fibres emerge from this milky resin furniture by Design Academy Eindhoven graduate Wiktoria Szawiel (+ movie).

For her Landscape Within project, Polish designer Wiktoria Szawiel set out to encapsulate the moods and materials of eastern European landscapes she grew up in within objects.

“I wanted to capture the beauty and the spirituality of an eastern landscape within a physical object,” Szawiel told Dezeen. “I tried to translate different aspects of landscape into materials, colours, techniques and shapes.”

She experimented with casting different grasses and plants in resin, creating samples that look similar to fossils trapped in stone.

“I think the quality of my material experimentation lays in the combination of opposites – natural and artificial,” said Szawiel.

For the final pieces, wood, wicker and rattan were woven into structures and set in the specially mixed resin. The shapes were then sanded down to reveal the intertwined fibres within.

“In a way if I combine resin with wood I ‘spoil’ it,” Szawiel said. “On the other hand I am revealing inner patterns that couldn’t be seen without it.”

She mixed resins in different proportions for each piece, so they have various textures and opacities.

Some of the items were cast in purpose-designed moulds, while in other cases the resin was poured over items of wicker furniture.

Following her graduation from Design Academy Eindhoven this year, Szawiel hopes to develop the project by using her production techniques for architectural applications.

The furniture collection currently includes chairs, stools and tables, and she is also working on a series of vases and containers using the same processes.

Other designers using resin to form furniture include Jo Nagasaka, who developed a range using the material for Established & Sons, and Wonmin Park, who constructed chairs and tables from slabs of coloured resin.

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