Review - Stockholm Furniture Fair
By Cate St Hill
Braving the snowy climes of midwinter Northern Europe, Cate St Hill found Stockholm to be a furniture fair full of emerging young talent, pared-back colours, clean lines and effortless cool
While the snow fell relentlessly outside, visitors to Stockholm Furniture Fair were greeted with three halls full to bursting with 700 exhibitors from over 30 countries.
Being Scandinavian in nature, with their pared-back colours and clean lines, this is evidently one of the effortlessly cool fairs. The emphasis was on young, emerging designers, developing new materials and innovative new ideas. It was also about stepping into the mind of the designer, focusing on their design process and production techniques.
The highlights of the fair were two smaller exhibitions, Inside Scandinavian Design and Twelve, that both looked at the methods behind Nordic design today. The former, curated and designed by Stockholm-based Färg & Blanche, focused on ten pieces of furniture and the work and values that went into producing them, from handcraftsmanship to robotised production lines. Prototypes, maquettes and videos were arranged underneath a lattice-like structure inspired by the patterns of traditional upholstered furniture. 'We wanted to show something that is normally not shown in a fair and to tell all the stories behind the work,' Fredrik Färg told Blueprint. 'We had this idea that we wanted to create a light space, so it's almost like stepping into a piece of furniture.'
Twelve, in comparison, curated by Johanna Agerman Ross, was broader and more conceptual in nature, but all the more successful for it. Twelve methods, ranging from 3D printing and archetypes to crowd-funding and performance, even dialogue and narrative, were represented by twelve different designers. The space itself, designed with Folkform, was a calm retreat from the hubbub of the rest of the fair - pale, beautiful, white concrete arches and podiums separated the work, while white-coat-clad staff were on hand to answer questions. And speaking of questions, Guest of Honour Ilse Crawford's lounge, titled Question Time, offered a place to sit and contemplate the often tricky but fundamental questions of design, such as 'do we need another chair?', pinned onto a giant cork wall.
The launch everyone was talking about, however, was Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec's Kaari Collection for Artek - certainly one of its most high-profile collaborations to date.
Richard Hutten's Satellite chair for Offecct
The collection fits so seamlessly with Alvar Aalto's original work, you could be forgiven for thinking that it was created by the architect himself. Kaari (meaning arch in Finnish) comprises rectangular and round tables as well as a desk, a wall unit and shelving, all united by a simple, black, triangular-shaped bent steel support combined with a band of solid wood.
Reminiscent of Aalto's bent L-leg, the pieces stood out for their effortless elegance in a flurry of kitsch, pastel colours and bold, neon accessories across the fair. 'The interplay between the solid vertical board and the metal band gives the base a surprisingly light appearance and creates a distinctive linear silhouette,' say the Bouroullecs. 'When several tables are present in the same room, their silhouettes have a rhythmic effect, making the otherwise static world of tables seem to vibrate.'
Elsewhere, Offecct displayed a number of new products by design heavyweights; two chairs by Richard Hutten and Jasper Morrison standing out in particular. Hutten's Satellite is a neat, round, spinning chair with a small side-table attached, which can orbit around the seat to suit both left- and right-handed people.
Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec's Kaari collection for Artek
'Architects always draw circles very fast to indicate where to position chairs on their floor plans. I thought that was a nice gesture so I drew a circle and said that it should be the top view of the chair,' says Hutten of the design process. Morrison's Kali chair, meanwhile, is a functional, wooden piece, whose proceeds will help fund an orphanage in northern Tanzania. For all its altruistic qualities though, its similarity to his Vitra Hal chair made it eerily familiar.
Other chairs that stood out - both completely opposite in their comfort credentials - were Rotterdam-based Studio WM's light and airy wire chairs for MENU and Doshi Levien's inviting Uchiwa chair for HAY, it's soft and cocoon-like shape inspired by Japanese hand fans. Also at HAY, Stefan Diez's shelving and storage system New Order had a new look for workspaces rather than domestic spaces. While there is nothing groundbreaking about the system itself - it's one of those things you walk away from and think 'ah that's clever' - now acoustic panels, sliding doors and handy cork trays for desk paraphernalia can be fitted to the modular units for never-ending configurations. In terms of lighting, Note Design Studio's Elements for Zero, inspired by dawn, dusk and midnight light in the Nordic mountains, caught the eye, as did French designer Inga Sempé's fun spinning-top-esque lamp for Wästberg.
POW by Vilde Øritsland Houge
Younger, less established designers from over 30 countries and many more schools were represented in Greenhouse and the Young Swedish Design exhibition - the result of a biannual award honouring young Swedish designers - designed by Note Design Studio. The extremely professional and well-finished furniture prototypes by 13 design students from Bergen Academy of Art and Design wouldn't have been out of place in the main halls of the fair. Heidi Karlsen Aarstad's Companion powder-coated, steel chair and Vilde Øritsland Houge's playful, rocking, half-sitting, half-standing POW, for example, seriously gave the more established designers a run for their money. Lund University's School of Industrial Design also had some innovative tools and systems to enable us to live a sustainable life in the future, from a chemical-free cleaning kit to a natural perfume-maker. Watch this space - here are tomorrow's design stars.
