shigeru ban: carbon fiber chair for tokyo fiber 09 senseware

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboomshigeru ban conceived a light-weight chair that uses carbon fiber TENAX® for lightness and tensile strength. rather than using carbon fiber on its own, he created a tough structure by sandwiching aluminium between thin layers of carbon fiber. the use of aluminium in the combination eanbles successful pinpointing of the characteristics of carbon fiber.

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboom

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboom carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboom

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboom‘I wanted to make a chair that is even lighter than the gio ponti’s superleggera – a chair so light that a child could pick it up with just his little finger. carbon fiber provide great tensile strength than all other materials, but it loses out on compressive strength, and carbon fibers are very slender. carbon fiber is also much more expensive than other materials and difficult to work. we tried to use only the material’s advantages and avoid its disadvantages, so we stuck a 0,25 mm carbon fiber layer onto each side of thin aluminium panels…’ shigeru ban

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban image © designboom carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban, detail image © designboom carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban, detail image © designboom carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban – aluminium structure

carbon fiber chair by shigeru ban