This special commission was to create the official chair, awarded as the poetry prize for the winning Bard at The National Eisteddfod of Wales 2012. It was a fantastic opportunity to explore ideas and techniques around this year’s festival theme of The Flow of the Tide.
The chair was designed over a three month period during which the design approach was based on that of writing a poem. Just as a poet seeks to make connections between words and phrases and in so doing creating different meanings and overall effect, so the components of the chair would combine to form a piece of unique furniture. By rooting the form of the chair within the process and context of a poem, the piece is inspired by and, in turn, has become an inspiration for, the Eisteddfod tradition it helps to celebrate.
The theme, The Flow of the Tides, sits very well with ideas that Andrew Lane has been developing over many years to do with linear, structural and aesthetic, design. Ideas that manipulate wood to create both a literal and structural line through a piece of furniture, a “flow” that holds a design together. As Andrew puts it:
“It is important in chair design to have a component that is linking and doing more than one job. A leg that can turn into an arm that can turn into a back is one component that is visually running through the piece and becoming a connecting element of the whole design.”
For the Eisteddfod Chair, the flow starts from the floor, comes up through the leg, continues through the arm and up into the back. By twisting and bending the wood into shape using steaming and laminating techniques, it makes a very slender, lightweight but strong piece of furniture.
Materials: White Ash
Dimensions: 550 x 550 x 1700mm
A film about the making of the Eisteddfod Chair.