Mushroom Side Table by Hyunjae Noh is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2025 Bronze A' Design Award in Furniture Design Competition Category.
BronzeFurniture· 2025
Mushroom Side Table
by Hyunjae Noh
Client: Hyunjae Noh
Bronze A' Design Award Winner in Furniture Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #166794The Design
About Mushroom Side Table
The Mushroom project is an eco-friendly initiative that repurposes wood scraps from furniture manufacturing into a uniquely designed small side table. Instead of discarding the scraps, they are carefully shaped into wide panels and arranged to form a three dimensional end grain pattern. The tabletop showcases an eye catching cross sectional design using three different types of wood, while the smoothly curved legs resemble a mushroom stem. With a height of 380mm, Mushroom functions as a coffee table or bedside table, giving new value to discarded wood while minimizing waste.
The Recognition
About the Bronze A' Design Award
Mushroom Side Table is a Bronze A' Design Award winner, a highly prestigious recognition granted to outstanding designs distinguished by creativity, ingenuity, and astuteness. Bronze winners are amply skillful and strikingly creative artifacts that authenticate the vast experience, imagination, and resourcefulness of their designers. Mushroom Side Table is expected to be a highly regarded, admired, and cherished object that is notably professional and innovative. This Bronze A' Design Award-winning design incorporates best practices in art, science, design, and technology, and is excellent for its attention to detail. Mushroom Side Table splendidly satisfies needs, touches desires, charms feelings, and appeals to curiosity.
Where to Get It
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Discuss Your ProjectInterviews
Grand Interview
Your innovative approach to sustainability in the Mushroom Side Table, particularly the repurposing of wood scraps into an end grain pattern, has earned recognition including the Bronze A' Design Award - could you elaborate on how this eco-friendly initiative evolved from concept to creation?
While exploring ways to recycle wood scraps generated during the furniture production process, I considered assembling small pieces into a single panel. During this process, I discovered that by using the end grain technique, I could not only create a unique pattern but also combine multiple pieces into a larger panel. This approach led to the creation of the tabletop for the Mushroom Side Table.
The Mushroom Side Table showcases a striking combination of three different wood types in its cross-sectional design - what inspired your choice of these specific materials, and how did you achieve the harmonious balance between them?
The Mushroom Side Table features a pattern made from three types of wood: walnut, hard maple, and cherry. I chose these materials because they were the most readily available and offered a harmonious contrast in color — from light beige to reddish brown to dark brown — which helped create a balanced and visually appealing pattern.
Could you walk us through the technical challenges of creating consistent forms from irregular wood scraps for the Mushroom Side Table, and how the laser-cut template solution emerged as your breakthrough moment?
To recycle irregular wood scraps, I needed to cut them into trapezoidal shapes with a 4cm top, 7.5cm bottom, and 3.5cm height using a table saw. At first, I drew each shape by hand with a pencil directly on the wood and cut them one by one. However, due to the small size and irregular shapes of the scraps, it became very difficult to use the table saw accurately and safely.To solve this issue, I laser-cut a thin wood sheet into a trapezoidal template, which I could attach to each scrap piece. This allowed me to cut all the pieces into a consistent shape with much greater precision and efficiency.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- During the furniture crafting process, a substantial amount of wood scraps is generated, often appearing in irregular shapes and small sizes, eventually being discarded. Mushroom is a small coffee table crafted by utilizing these wood scraps, presenting a unique mushroom shaped design. The tabletop is created by recycling three different types of wood scraps, forming an intriguing end-grain pattern.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- 380mm x 380mm x 400mm
- Tags
- wood, craft, coffee, table, eco friendly, sustainable
- Production Technology
- To efficiently utilize wood scraps, the end grain technique was used to create wooden panels. This approach not only allowed the creation of larger panels from smaller pieces but also showcased the unique patterns characteristic of end grain wood. The panel was then shaped into a circular tabletop and finished with oil to ensure durability and longevity. The table legs were crafted by laminating multiple layers of wood together and refining only the edges using a lathe, minimizing waste. This method significantly reduced the amount of discarded material during furniture production.
- Design Challenge
- To create the end grain pattern, the small wood scraps had to be shaped into consistent forms. While the wood pieces were too small to safely use a table saw, I was able to make a template using a laser cutter. By combining the template with the wood scraps, I was able to shape all the pieces into the same form.
- Research
- The Mushroom project is an initiative to recycle wood scraps generated during furniture manufacturing, rather than discarding them. The scraps are carefully shaped to create wide panels, and then arranged to form a three dimensional end grain pattern. Through this project, discarded wood scraps are given new value, and the amount of waste wood is minimized, making it an environmentally friendly solution.
- Inspiration
- While taking a furniture-making course at OCAD University, I learned that the production process often generates a significant amount of wood scraps, most of which end up being discarded. These wood pieces were of high quality but were overlooked due to their small size. At OCAD University, these scraps were collected in one place for students to use freely. Seeing this, I was inspired to gather various wood pieces to make furniture.
- Project Duration
- This project was initiated in November 2022 and completed in December 2022 at OCAD University in Toronto.
- Operation Flow
- Mushroom is a small table with a height of 380mm. It can be used as a coffee table or a bedside table and is characterized by its use of discarded wood to create a beautiful patterned wood panel, which is then used in its construction.
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