This design iss incredibly clever and cute. Designer & Architect, Naihan Li from Beijing presented his crates that unfold into furniture pieces at the Beijing Design Week in 2011.
Each piece appears as a neat box crate, and as you unfold the hinges, it becomes a practical set of furniture.
The best about this design is: “This is how moving day will be like!”
When Pedersen + Lennard launched their bucket chair design, I had always kept my eyes glued on them for news on new developments. Each product since then has never failed to make my jaw drop.
I have this silly wishlist system, where I put all the things I’d wish to achieve or own one day. Last year Elle decor did a piece on their furniture collection, I made my little cut out, and made it my “one day, you’ll be mine” piece.
Pedersen and Lennard’s showroom is at the Field Office in Cape Town. They wanted to clear the existing range to make space to exhibit their new products. In celebration of the Field Office’s first birthday, they decided to host an auction on the current products on display there. I was hoping that I’d soon be able to take my “one day, you’ll be mine piece” home with me. Last week Friday, 30th of September, I registered as a buyer at an auction for my very first time 
Both the designers were present at the Auction, and casually mingled with the people attending the acution. There was nothing intimidating about the auction, in fact it had a very down to earth vibe.
The items that were being Auctioned became part of the events furniture. Everyone there casually made themselves comfortable. The manger of Field Office, Will, made the evening very entertaining with his flamboyant style of hosting the auction.
As beautiful as everything on auction was, I was qutie specific with what I wanted. I wanted a bench for the entrance hallway. I waited patiently for what I was there for. As soon as the bidding started, I waited for the other participants to set the bids. Will was about to declare the items sold at “going twice” – when I raised my auction number, and waved to his direction. Another bidder tried to get it off my hands, and I waved my number again at Will. Will started on the count down, and as soon as he yelled “Sold” I received a huge adrenalin rush. It wasn’t from the hype of winning the auction, but rather a dream come true to finally own Pedersen and Lennard pieces!
Ta-dum…. meet my beautiful collection…. I still have to set it up, but these are my core entrance hall pieces.
The crate under the bench was auctioned for separately. It was one of the first pieces that Pedersen and Lennard experimented with in their earlier years of design. I felt rather attached to that notion. Back when I was still a university student, I had a home-made coffee table with the same kind of plastic crate, with a wooden plank nailed to it. In a sense I felt truly inspired by how their passion paved their success to creating and perfecting the beautiful range they have today. To think that it started off a crate, compared to what they create now – brings goose bumps upon that thought. I’m so thrilled to finally enter my home to find the sight of Pedersen and Lennard’s beautiful designs.
Visit the field office to view their new range.
7 barrack street
Cape Town
021-4614599
[PS I have a facebook page, join me on my page to find out about these events in the future]
Valentina is a London based designer. Coming from a Mexican heritage she has fascinated the world by her Prickly Pear Chair design by fusing the aristocratic heritage of luxury with colours and shapes of the flamboyant aspects of the beautiful Mexican culture.
She has recently had an online interview with Design Gallerist. See the interview here and get to know more about Valentina here.
On the same year of press releasing this design, she also released the “Ghost of a Chair”. The concept of this design was to bring out the shape of the classic Louis XV chair if it were to be draped over by a piece of fabric. The chairs have different genders. The ones with an arm are males, and the ones without the arms are females.
These collectors chair designs are made to order with options to customize colours. Each Chair has unique draping folds due to the process of creating this piece. See Valentina’s site for contact details here.
John Green, a British product designer, who has won many design awards through the sophistication of his simple designs. The craft in his work have clean crisp outlooks, and serve not only to please the eye aesthetically, but the great designs also serve as functional units for a simple and pure lifestyle.
The warm tones of these pieces bring the luxury of design into a space.
His transformation of waste products into functional designs are incredible. He is currently collaborating with Snowhome, and has produced a range of designs for their furniture range. See his products here.
I admire his pantone design. All designers love their pantone books, and he has used it as an inspiration for a quirky magnetic notice board.
It was lovely meeting John Green through the courtesy of the world wide web. Hope you enjoyed meeting him too!
In light of celebrating Easter, I’ve dedicated this post to shapes of furniture inspired from the “egg shape”. Rounded edge furniture were more common in the Retro days. Jaime Hayon, a spanish designer has brought the Retro edged furnishing into a urban space setting, where his works are styled with the contemporary touch that credit inspiration to vintage shapes.
This particular design caught my fancy, the project is FAVN for Fritz Hansen. This is a collaboration work between Jaime Hayon and Danish designer Fritz Hansen. The shape of the sofa is inspired and based on a shell. He explains it as a piece with a protective exterior, and an embracing interior. I’m so glad to have found this piece for my Easter post!
There are many beautiful shades of basics and brights.
Jaime Hayon is renowned for his works. His portfolio from his studio includes collections of designer toys, beautiful ceramics and a stunning furniture range. Amongst all of those creations, he has also done a few interiors and design installations. This particular installation fits perfectly in this Easter post. Jaime Hayon took part in renovating the information center for the Groninger Museum in December 2010, Netherlands’s contemporary art and design museum.
Hope you all had a fantastic Easter weekend!
I had an idea, a beautiful MIKU みく idea. That idea was to create an online platform where people can purchase inspirational collectables for the unusual home. All the small collectables would be made with love by local South African designers, and produced from their studios of creativity. I’m very happy to declare that my idea is now an action. Here is a sneak preview on the development of the MIKU みく store, which is to launch in mid April 2011.
Running alongside the MIKU みく store, I have set up the MIKU Inspirations blog. On this blog I will be posting inspiring pictures of anything beautiful. You don’t need to be a designer to be inspired or to understand certain pieces of creation. Design speaks to your soul, and when you see one that speaks to you…. you’ll know.
To celebrate, my first blog post, I would like to dedicate this page as a [South Africa Only] page. Over the past year, I’ve been following more on interiors, and I have been absolutely flabbergasted by local designers. They have earned their acclamation in the national and international platforms of design, and I take my hat off to to all these beautiful creations every time I spot them.
DOKTER AND MISSES - Adriaan Hugo
Amazing works…. sigh…. so MIKU!!
