We’re smiling at Jaime Hayon’s Happy Hooks for Fritz Hansen
Name: Happy Hook
Designer: Jaime Hayon for Fritz Hansen
Price: £52
‘The Happy Hook is an object that reminds us to smile in hard times,’ says Spanish designer and artist Jaime Hayon of his new hooks for Danish firm Fritz Hansen. Simple and playful, the design harks back to Hayon’s past on the skateboard scene, when this motif was his art tag. Happy Hook’s three-pronged model allows for multifunctional use, and brings cheer to the room via a plethora of colour options. ‘Smile and be positive is essential to life. This is why I made the happy hook ... function and a message melt together.’
Name: Melt Chair
Designer: Bower Studios
Price: $16,000
Building upon its knack for bending perspectives, New York design practice Bower Studios has created a concrete and chrome-plated brass chair which playfully experiments with materiality and its perceived traits. Inspired by an ancient Egyptian statue known as ‘Statue of a Seated Isis’, that has been dated to around 650 BC, the Melt Chair emulates the sculpture’s geometric seat, which also depicts a cushion draped over its back. In the contemporary version, the chair’s frame has been rendered in thin reflective planes of chrome-plated brass, while concrete playfully folds over itself to form the top, almost resembling fabric or ice cream.
‘This contrast between material and perceived properties shaped by form is the unexpected surprise we exploit in the Melt Chair,’ explains the firm’s design director Danny Gianella. ‘It’s the idea of [making] a material with a set of traits feel like a different material with opposing traits, simply by the way its formed and interacts with other objects.’ The chair has been produced in a limited edition run of 20 and is also available in a limited edition black marble version as well.
Name: Triplex Stool
Designer: Studio RYTE
Price: on request
Weighing less that 1.8kg, this stool is an experiment in art and science. Built by fabricators in Stuttgart, that usually work within the automotive industry, the modular piece is made up of flax fibre, with bio-resin as the binding agent. To further decrease the carbon footprint, Hong Kong-based Studio RYTE have designed the stool as multiple parts, and are aiming to go one step further in its switch to plant power – they are currently testing to create a more organic binder material. 3mm thick and biodegradable, the stool has a dynamic green textured surface, that compliments its highly engineered curves
Name: Vases
Designer: Bloc Studios & Tableau
Price: from €830
In an art and design collaboration, Bloc Studios, founded in Carrara teams up with Copenhagen-based flower studio Tableau for a set of ten vases. Mini mountains of stone get a contemporary intervention from steel producing an abstract house for simple arrangements to live. Available in stone included White Onyx, Red Francia and Travertino, the pieces are monolithic ornaments – described as ‘a clash between raw materials and the softness of flowers’
Name: ‘Boboli’ Console
Designer: Rodolfo Dordoni, for Cassina
Price: £2,450
A characteristically geometric design from Rodolfo Dordoni, this console is part of a series of new additions to the ‘Boboli’ family of products that includes side and coffee tables. The slick, burnished aluminium legs spiral upwards, like vertically trained plants in a classical Italian garden. Topped with a slick marble slab, the console is architectural in construction and altar-like in stature
Name: ’Trinidad’ chair, black
Designer: Nanna Ditzel, produced by Fredericia Furniture, available from WallpaperSTORE*
Price: £502
Bold and striking, Nanna Ditzel’s ’Trinidad’ chair is a statement piece in every sense. Cut from black ash wood and defined by cut-out fretwork on its curved shell back, the chair was ground-breaking when it debuted in 1993. As well as being well-ventilated and stackable, the lightweight design is decorative and functional in equal parts, making it equally suited to both public and private settings — no doubt a key factor in its standing as a modern classic
