‘Spaziale Series’ by Studio Wai & Lanzavecchia

Time to Design awards upcoming designers with fresh and original ideas, helping them get on their feet and make a name for themselves in what can be a ruthless industry. In 2009, the bizarre ‘Spaziale Series‘ by young duo Hunn Wai and Francesca Lanzavecchia won accolade for their interior furniture designs that is supposed to bring new means of interaction between furniture, space and human beings.

All of Studio Wai & Lanzavecchia’s pieces feature frames that are built from maple trees. The rigid acer wood provides the simplistic foundations from which the key element of the ‘Spaziale Series’ differentiates itself from all other furniture designs out there.

Variously colored, stretchy fabrics are draped over, in, and around the wooden framework, molding together the body of each piece. The result is somewhat freaky, for lack of a better word, somewhere between furniture and an alien life form.

If the wood is the bones of the body, then the fabric is the skin. This skin allows the furniture to slightly change its shape as well as its color, like an extraterrestrial chameleon.

The color of the shelf cover can be easily switched from red, to blue, or to purple, while protecting the books at the same time.

And a commode with a deposit drop hole at the top can easily be unwrapped from the side to remove whatever items are inside. And with a change in the wrapping of the skin, a chair somehow turns into a private trap.

The pieces of the ‘Spaziale Series’ might not seem like much. In fact, they really aren’t, they are just simple but strange designs that wouldn’t feel out of place in a twisted Tim Burton animation. It is an acquired taste, more suited to a design showcase than to a home, but with plenty of fans out there, expect these vibrant designs to stick around.

Wai & Lanzavecchia currently have residency in Denmark’s National Workshops for Arts and Crafts.

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by Henry Guyer
Gloobbi Design

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