We’ll be having a launch party for the Reee Chair on September 10, from 6.30 until 9.00 pm in central London. This is our chance to thank the many organisations that have helped us to bring this new product to the market, since we started planning it in 2006, and show the finished product to our customers, press and partners.

Reee Chair

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Scotland’s Innovative Craft group have organised an exhibition of sustainable products with One Eco Home for the duration of the Edinburgh Festival. They are showing the Grass cabinet as an example of sustainable furniture design.

Bamboo and straw domestic cabinet

On Wednesday this week, our colleague Eray Cayli presented his research into Utility Furniture at the Green and Trifty seminar organised by London Remade. If you’re a product designer, a design student or simply somebody with an interest in sustainable design, you’re sure to find his insights persuasive and inspiring.

Eray’s central point — as I understand it — is that the Utility Furniture scheme applied austerity measures not only to material supply and manufacturing processes, but also to the creative freedom and experimental curiosity of designers in that period (1942 - 1952). Imagine being constrained for 10 years of your working life by design committees staffed by bureauctratic appointees.

Are we risking our liberty to explore and develop new designs, materials and processes as British designers of the 1930s had done, unwittingly? If design professionals won’t moderate their own environmental impact, who will do it for them? Would it be possible for restraints to be applied centrally by governments or trade authorities to limit our work for the benefit of a low-carbon economy in the future?

Importantly, Eray has also spotted opportunities that arose from the Utility scheme, particularly for small local manufacturers who benefitted from a shortened supply and distribution network. They picked up the business that was previously aggregated by the big producers in High Wycombe and London’s East End. Will we increasingly make a virtue of local supply and short journeys?

You can download Eray’s presentation directly here. We’ll be podcasting the audio and slides in the next few days, once Eray has settled back in Istanbul.

If you want to follow up on the research into Utility Furniture and its application to new resource-efficient manufacturing business models, contact Pli or comment here and we’ll pick up the conversation with you.

Eray Cayli spent a couple of months with Pli this summer, working on a life cycle analysis tool for product designers. Some of his blog posts on this site have sparked interest among other designers. He has been invited to speak at the Green and Thrifty event on Wednesday evening this week (18 June).

Eray has travelled from Istanbul to share his research and ideas at this seminar. If you will be in London and you have an interest in sustainable design, I highly recommend his presentation.

Note: you need to register to attend but there are some places left. Click the London Remade logo to register.

Here are the details:
Date: 18 June 2008
Time: 4 — 7pm
Venue: Rich Mix Centre 35 - 47 Bethnal Green Road,
London E1 6LA

Eray will be talking about Utility furniture. He’ll be comparing the design and product development trends of the 1940s with our own situation. I guarantee you’ll think differently about your priorities, opportunities and risks as a designer once you have heard what Eray has to say about his studies in mid 20th Century design.

The Green and Thrifty event has been put together by London Remade. There’ll be a panel of speakers talking about thrifty design and thrifty business. There’ll be an exhibition on site, featuring [re]design and others. There will be drinks and things to eat. There will be a rag and bone cart, so bring your electronics waste for recycling. There will be lots of interesting people to meet.

Green and Thrifty is part of the Love London festival, running from 1–21 June. Click on the image to go to the Love London website…

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In January 08, Pli exhibited at the Interiors Birmingham Exhibition and fortunately we were able to secure a bit of air time on the show’s TV network. The clip is about strengthening the role of environmental furniture in the British furniture industry. Enjoy.

The Jean Prouvé exhibition ends on April 13. There’s just one week left to go and see this excellent collection of the French designer and manufacturer’s work at the Design Museum, by Tower Bridge in London. The Brit Insurance Designs of the Year exhibition is also running, upstairs, and you can catch it until 27 April.

The Prouvé exhibition is laid out as a sequence of explorations into different aspects of his work. From the first exhibit, Prouvé is depicted here as a mature designer with a ready-established aesthetic and expertise.

Prouvé’s work is significant for succeeding generations of furniture designers and architects. Like Alvar Aalto (well presented by Shigeru Ban in last year’s Barbican exhibition) he offered his clients a combination of true craftsmanship, innovation and a vision that went beyond the bounds of the briefs he was set.
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Pli was invited to talk at the sustainable design seminar held at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London on 4 March ‘08. I made a short presentation about the Reee chair to an audience of very well-informed and engaging product designers, design students, interior designers and manufacturers.

You can download all the presentations, including my slides, from the London Remade site (click on the logo).

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Pli exhibited our latest range of tables and chairs at the Collection at Interiors Birmingham from 20-23 January. We received the award for Best Innovation 2008 at the show. Which was nice.

The London Design Festival runs between 20 and 23 September - the Reee® chair is on display at two different locations so we hope you’ll be able to visit our stands and say hello…

* in the London Manufacturing Advisory Service exhibition at Designers Block on 3-10 Shoreditch High Street and
* in [re]design’s SIT UP exhibition at 100% Design in Earl’s Court (Stand O165, 100% Futures).

The Reee® chair goes to the Eden Project on 25 May where it’ll be displayed as part of the kNOwtrash Exhibition in the Core Building. The kNOwtrash exhibition will be opened by Tim Smit, CEO of the Eden Project.

Pli launched our latest prototype product, the Reee™ chair, at the Metropolitan Works 07 Show on 10 May. The Metropolitan Works gallery is at 41 Commercial Road, London E1 1LA. The exhibition runs until 24 May and it’s open to the public.

Pli exhibited the Hoop and Grass tables at the [re]design exhibition. This is its second year and it has grown enormously. As before, the exposure to thousands of interested and enthusiastic visitors has given us a huge boost. This is the only annual exhibition Pli is committed to: we’ll be back in 2007.