after drawing inspiration from skeletal structures, connective joints, and other design tissues, MAD architects’ founder and director, ma yansong, named his contemporary armchair for sawaya & moroni: ‘gu.’ each surface of the chair — presented at milan design week 2018 — cements itself with the others organically, as if it were a living organism, frozen mid-metamorphosis. note: the translation of gu is bones.

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all images courtesy of MAD architects

 

 

the chair’s heavy wood grain points hard in certain directions, then softens seamlessly into smooth curves. at silhouette, the chair may look more like a funky, futuristic sculpture, or an undulating ode to organs. but according to ma yansong, the chair for sawaya & moroni was simply meant to play with users’ preconceptions of shapes and lines, by exploring materiality with human contours. 

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project info:

 

location: via alessandro manzoni, 11, milan
design team: ma yansong, dang qun, yosuke hayano, andrea d’antrassi, casey kell, matthew pugh