{"id":781,"date":"2023-08-15T09:45:43","date_gmt":"2023-08-15T09:45:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vibergirls.com\/?p=781"},"modified":"2023-08-18T14:58:21","modified_gmt":"2023-08-18T14:58:21","slug":"egg-chair-would-not-be-designed-today-say-luke-pearson-and-tom-lloyd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/vibergirls.com\/index.php\/2023\/08\/15\/egg-chair-would-not-be-designed-today-say-luke-pearson-and-tom-lloyd\/","title":{"rendered":"“Egg chair would not be designed today” say Luke Pearson and Tom Lloyd"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Arne<\/div>\n

Concave chairs like Arne Jacobsen<\/a>‘s Egg and Eero Saarinen<\/a>‘s Womb don’t meet today’s definition of good design, according to the founders of design studio Pearson Lloyd<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Luke Pearson and Tom Lloyd said furniture with glued upholstery no longer makes sense because it is too difficult to recycle.<\/p>\n

They argue that mid-century designs like the Egg and Womb, which require a large amount of glue to achieve their concave shapes, are no longer appropriate for production.<\/p>\n

“People still hold up the Egg chair as an icon of design, even though it’s made of textile glued onto foam and moulded onto metal, making it almost impossible to repair or recycle,” Lloyd told Dezeen.<\/p>\n

“Any textile which is a concave surface is not fit for purpose any more,” he said.<\/p>\n

Shift to “planet-first approach”<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a joint statement sent exclusively to Dezeen, titled “Why the Egg chair would not be designed today”, the Pearson Lloyd<\/a> founders said that today’s furniture must embrace the circular economy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

They said the definition of “good design” must now consider environmental impact.<\/p>\n

“We are no longer able to judge the quality of a design by aesthetics alone,” they said.<\/p>\n

“The value proposition of design is shifting rapidly towards a planet-first approach, and it is leading us to question how we behave and what we make. If a design doesn’t minimise carbon and maximise circularity, is it good?”<\/p>\n

\"Womb
Pearson and Lloyd said the Womb chair doesn’t meet today’s definition of sustainability either. Photo by Brooklyn Museum via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Finnish architect Eero Saarinen developed the Womb chair in 1946. It went into production for furniture brand Knoll<\/a> two years later.<\/p>\n

Danish architect Arne Jacobsen designed the Egg chair, as well as the smaller Swan chair<\/a>, in 1958 for the interior of the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen. They were marketed by Danish brand Fritz Hansen<\/a> soon after and have been in continuous production ever since.<\/p>\n

“Almost impossible” to recycle<\/strong><\/p>\n

All three designs are produced by glueing leather or textile onto polyurethane foam, then moulding it over a structural frame of metal or fibreglass.<\/p>\n

This results in products that are easy to manufacture and highly lightweight, but it also makes them harder to recycle and consequently increases their ecological footprint.<\/p>\n

This technology was revolutionary in the mid-20th century, but Pearson and Lloyd believe it has since become defunct, due to “the poor environmental credentials of this material stack”.<\/p>\n