Designing the SeatTable

1. I had the structure, I had the pattern now I needed to combine them to create my SeatTable. Faced with the challenge to design a flat-packed multi-functional piece of furniture in cardboard I initially carried out two lines of research. One was into the use of cardboard in furniture design such as the work by Frank O’ Gehry. The second was to test the strength of cardboard-it was, after all, going to be supporting someone’s weight! If the flutes of the corrugated cardboard run vertically they can support a considerable weight. But this does mean that the design has to incorporate supportive upright verticals. So I then started to play around with simple geometric shapes. This H shape proved to be very supportive and I then produced the design’s structure based around this. I needed to come up with a design that would be multi-functional. I decided that the table (which would need to be blocky in shape to be strong enough) could have two stools inserted into gaps so I then went about creating a basic H shaped design for the table’s supportive structure. The SeatTable, a design by Sara Wickenden. Designing the SeatTable I quickly discovered that simple cardboard, the type we use for packaging could be remarkably strong. I created a simple column from single wall corrugated cardboard and started to build up the weights. I’d run out of weights and spare bricks by this stage..... I combined some of these shapes that I knew would be supportive into simple furniture style set-ups. I needed to then design a suitable pattern to be laminated onto the cardboard. The blocky shape that hade been evolving proved to be a valuable source of inspiration. I’d been put in mind of roughly hewn rocks and decided to dig out some photos I’d taken of fossils embedded into rock and found one that looked interesting. I worked on this image in Photoshop to create a pattern.