Seating situation: Layer’s ’Cradle’ collection comes to Clerkenwell

Looking down from above at a chair with a red mesh back, and a navy seat
For Clerkenwell Design Week, Layer transformed Clerkenwell London's reading room into a delightful lounge of colour and comfort with the 'Cradle' collection, designed for Moroso by Benjamin Hubert
(Image credit: TBC)

How to enhance performance through the reimagining of traditional product typologies is a bit of an obsession for Layer's Benjamin Hubert.

Take his Clerkenwell Design Week showcase, for example. As well as his 3D printed 'GO' wheelchair, Layer transformed Clerkenwell London's reading room into a delightful lounge of colour and comfort with the 'Cradle' collection, designed for Moroso.

Originally unveiled at Milan's Salone del Mobile, the Clerkenwell showing brought the trio of designs together, using the high-back and low-back chairs to create comfortable seating pockets, with dynamic room dividers completing the scene.

'We have a passion for developing new materials to solve problems at Layer,' explains Hubert, 'and in combination with Moroso’s love of textiles, we have arrived at a new type of mesh construction that offers better comfort through less materials, delivering a rich new aesthetic.'

Using a three-dimensional stretch textile created in collaboration with an Austrian factory, the knitted material is at once high strength and low density; lending flexible support to sitters and visual vibrancy in one fell swoop. A metal backrest cradles the cushioned seat block, and of course all colours can be customised.

Aside from the strong visual statement, the chairs also make a seriously satisfying seating experience – the elegance of a conventional upholstered lounge chair with the unique comfort of a hammock, without the hassle of awkwardly climbing in and out.

Front, side and back views of a red mesh chair with a navy upholstered seat

The Clerkenwell showing brought the trio of designs together, using the high-back and low-back chairs to create comfortable seating pockets

(Image credit: TBC)

A red mesh chair with pink seat, and a green mesh chair with teal seat

Aside from the strong visual statement, the chairs also make a seriously satisfying seating experience

(Image credit: TBC)

Folding black mesh room divider

Dynamic room dividers completed the scene at Clerkenwell London

(Image credit: TBC)

3D stretch textile in ten different colourways

The collection is realised in a three-dimensional stretch textile created in collaboration with an Austrian factory

(Image credit: TBC)

A woman sitting in a chair made with a red and white mesh back, and a deep, navy blue seat

'With Moroso’s love of textiles, we have arrived at a new type of mesh construction that offers better comfort through less materials, delivering a rich new aesthetic,' explains Hubert

(Image credit: TBC)

INFORMATION

Photography courtesy of Layer