The Contemporary Craft Fair at Bovey Tracey saw three furniture designers – Carl Clerkin, Chris Eckersley and William Warren – square off in a race to make as many chairs as they could over the weekend, inventing new designs on the spot and making improvised variations. Why – well a bit of fun and to demonstrate how much can be learned through the act of making.
The inspiration for this event started a year ago, when a group of furniture designers assembled in the woods of Herefordshire to learn the ancient art of “bodging” – greenwood chair-making. They each made a chair which went on to be exhibited at the Milan Furniture Fair and have been shown at a number of other design shows. Then for the London Design Festival last September, they were invited by the V&A to present what they called “The Fantastic Broomstick Bodge”, where for one evening, assisted by the public, they made an improvised collection of benches, quickly created from boomsticks for legs and plywood for seats. For many attending the event it was their first real experience of hands-on making.
ercol were delighted to provide some parts for the guys to work with in their creations for the Great Windsor Chair Race – our favourite – probably the child’s trolley with a bent chair hoop as the handle for sheer cuteness, but then it’s not really a chair….
You can see more images on our Flickr site at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ercol/sets/72157627199151664/
The designers:
Bodging:
More images of the Great Windsor Chair Race:
http://www.bodgingmilano.co.uk/section515857.html
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