Xinrui Li

03/12/2020

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Throughout the 1960s, designers began to experiment with new materials for furniture design. Until then, chairs were usually made of wood, aluminium tubing, leather, etc. From the 1960s onwards, a number of designers began to use plastic as a furniture material, such as Eames, Saarinen, Verner Panton, Verner’s The Panton chairs were a sensation at the time, afterwards people were looking for a cheaper alternative to plastic but needed to be as flexible as plastic, and at that time, cardboard was explored as a furniture material. It was often just a single layer and attempts to reinforce the way it was made by folding and inserting tabs and slots. But Gehry’s approach to cardboard is truly unprecedented, Gehry’s Wiggle Design collection was released close to the time when designers’ exploration of cardboard began to dwindle in the 1970s.

It all started in 1969, Frank Gehry was asked by some artists and scientists from NASA to redesign the artist Robert Irwin’s studio, due to a lack of budget, Gehry came up with a cheap, easily available and sustainable material to make some furniture, which is the cardboard, this is the background story; Gehry usually made models out of cardboard, he knew that if the cardboard was glued together, it would have a very good hardness, and he began experimenting with it, glueing and sawing them to form different curved shapes.

When Easy Edges launched in 1972, the collection garnered immediate attention. The centerpiece was the Wiggle Side Chair, it was made by glueing layers of card in alternating directions, which is my favourite one, its twisted lines with a previously inconceivable construction technique signified a striking departure from the cardboard furniture designed in the preceding years.

Unfortunately, however, Gehry was not satisfied with the selling prices at the time and felt that the furniture should be affordable for everyone, so he decided to stop production of the Easy Edges and focus instead on his own architectural designs.

We can see Gehry’s characteristic curvilinear design language and sculptural sense in his Easy Edges series, and we know that one of his most famous building is the Guggenheim Museum, its overall structure and curvilinear shape is incredible when you saw it, you had no idea how it had been designed, let alone that the designer had come up with such an amazing idea, it could be described as a mega sculpture of urban public art, the materials used in the building, such as glass, steel and limestone, as well as titanium cladding, were challenging at the time of construction and have since been recognised as some of the most spectacular deconstructionist buildings in the world. Like Gehry’s buildings, his work is very sculptural, resulting in his own unique design language and his groundbreaking Easy Edges series of designs. The artistic impact of this is strongly felt.

When it comes to cardboard, it is a material that does not last, and with use, and changes in the environment, there is inevitable damage, such as cardboard falling off, but as well as being very good in terms of sustainability, I think the more important thing about cardboard is that it bears the marks of use, and carries with it a sense of belonging to the user and the designer of the chair. Mutual interactivity, as one sits on it, gives a deeper sense of the journey Gehry was on when it was designed, and the material, just as it changes over time, no matter how much it has been deformed or damaged, gives a clear indication of the traces of the user, documenting feelings, memories, and experiences of use.

We are familiar with the use of cardboard as a sustainable material, which is reflected in many artworks and designs, but Gehry’s Easy Edges collection really surprised me with the possibilities of cardboard, it definitely is a sculptural artwork.

Reference

Martin, H. (2018), A Wiggle Side Chair and Stool in a Gluck+ Bedroom.Photo by Scott Frances., available at https://media.architecturaldigest.com/photos/5c1018c78d2a442e24105846/16:9/w_2560%2Cc_limit/AD010119_object_lesson_gehry_02.jpg.

“The Building”. (n.d.). Guggenheim Bilbao, available at https://www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/the-building (accessed 3 December 2020).

Gehry, F. (n.d.). “Vitra”, Vitra, available at: https://www.vitra.com/en-as/living/product/details/wiggle-side-chair (accessed 3 December 2020a).

Gehry, F.O. (n.d.). “Frank O. Gehry. Easy Edges Side Chair. 1972”, The Museum of Modern Art, available at: https://www.moma.org/collection/works/86473 (accessed 3 December 2020b).