Growing a chair; Vegetal Chair

In 19th century North America young trees were shaped over the course of several years until they adopted the contours of a chair. Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec were so fascinated by this traditional technique that they came up with the idea of designing a “grown chair.” What has to grow needs time and as such Vegetal was created in an unusually long design process taking four years after the first idea emerged. The stackable chair is made of recyclable fibre-reinforced polyamide. Flat branches extend and interweave into an asymmetrical, irregular circle-shaped seating shell. The woven strips are stabilized by ribs which grow downwards and merge with the legs. Viewed from the rear Vegetal looks like a leaf with several stalks and numerous veins branching off.

Have a look here to find out how they solved the problem of the different layers.

Images

Sketch of the Vegetal

Stacks of vegetals

Sketch of the Vegetal

by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec