Fier Mobilier · 2018

Zene Scaun de dining

by John G Williams

A' Design Award de Fier 2018 in Mobilier
CLIENT: John G Williams
Estimated Number of Design Views: 12,482
Verification code 96FFCBB562 · Verify this award

View at A' Design Award Press Release

Colors

About Zene Scaun de dining

Scaunul de dining Zene se inspiră din lemnul autohton și din designul danez modern. Cadrele ușoare din frasin sunt simple și robuste și susțin șezuturi și spătare din lemn masiv care par să plutească deasupra cadrului. Formele curbate ale șezutului și spătarului nu sunt obținute prin îndoirea lemnului, ci prin îmbinarea și modelarea lemnului masiv de esență tare. Ca serie, cadrele ușoare din frasin asigură coerență, iar diferitele materiale locale selectate pentru șezuturi și spătare generează interes și relevanță.

About the A' Design Award de Fier

Zene Scaun de dining a câștigat A' Design Award de Fier, o recunoaștere prestigioasă acordată designurilor bune care îndeplinesc cerințele profesionale și industriale așteptate de la creații bine concepute. Câștigătorii Fierului demonstrează mare pricepere, înaltă specializare, înțelegere de specialitate și capacitate creativă din partea creatorilor lor. Se așteaptă ca Zene Scaun de dining să fie o creație foarte apreciată, admirată și prețuită, practică și inovatoare. Acest design câștigător al A' Design Award de Fier integrează cele mai bune practici din industrie și are caracteristici tehnice competente îmbinate cu know-how și talent. Pentru acuratețea sa, Zene Scaun de dining merită respect și este conceput pentru a aduce îmbunătățiri ale calității vieții care ajută la facerea lumii un loc mai bun.

Press Kit

Unique Properties: This series of dining chairs have American ash frames and showcase different hardwood timbers for the seat/backrest combinations.

The chairs draw on the ancient art of 'coopering' or how oak barrels are made for fermentation purposes. The curved forms of the seat/backrest are not formed by bending but rather by joining and shaping solid hardwood timber.

The chair strives to be very strong and beautiful. In short: Zene -
elegant, comfortable and dependable.
Dimensions & Packaging: 515mm wide x 570mm deep x 890mm high
seat: 515mm wide x 390mm deep
back:515mm wide x 200mm high
Tags: zene, dining chair, south africa, hardwood, curved, cooper, danish modern, minimalist
Production Technology: The Zene design evolved over a number of years. The starting point was probably a fascination with the art of coopering and how this has been applied to furniture design. Building the segmented seat and backrests took some practice to perfect, as did the development of custom modifications to standard workshop tools to shape and finish the smoothly shaped forms.
Design Challenge: Building the coopered seat/backrests was challenging as it required careful attention to the compression forces on the material and how best to achieve high compression without causing the seats to 'implode'.
Shaping the rough seats into finely finished and smooth curves required considerable re-working of the custom tooling to achieve the desired results
Research: Danish modern designs were studied and absorbed to consider different ways of rendering the frame, and its relationship to the seat, and to think through the spatial relationship of the seat to the backrest.
Web search was used to think about typical dimensions for the seat but in the end prototyping proved most fun.
Inspiration: The beauty grain and colour of indigenous African timber was a key aesthetic inspiration for this project. The more technical inspiration for the overall work, including the frame design came from iconic designers such as Hans J Wegner (for example the CH20 Elbow Chair). The coopering technique was inspired by Ontario furniture designer Adrian Ferrazzutti.
Project Duration: The first prototype was conceived in Johannesburg in 2007. It was slowly refined as background task over 10 years, and the first set of 6 chairs was produced in 2017
Operation Flow: Zene is designed mainly for use at the dining table and is designed for extended dining comfort.
Patents: no patents pending
Image Credits: all images by the designer: John G Williams