Ash side chair with seat and back made from recycled coffee beans.
Identifier
FPF488
Title
Ash side chair with seat and back made from recycled coffee beans.
Date
2009
Description
An ash side chair with seat and back made from re-cycled coffee beans, Coffee Bean chair designed by Adam Fairweather and Nick Rawcliffe.
Full Description
This side chair has an ash frame of conventional form but with unique details, including the jigsaw-type joints and one back post being taller than the other. The main feature is that the seat and back are panels of a material named Curface (sometimes spelt with a cedilla c), made from recycled coffee beans. The panels are fitted to the frame with brass rivets cast in the form of coffee beans. The Coffee Bean chair is a prototype of a design by Adam Fairweather and Nick Rawcliffe, made in 2009 by Smile Plastics, using recycling technology developed by Re-worked, a UK-based design firm.
Fairweather and Rawcliffe designed this chair as a prototype to highlight the potential for making furniture from sustainable materials. Curface is a high-impact, polystyrene thermoplastic board made from used coffee grounds, collected from offices, factories and cafes, combined with waste plastic and formed into pellets, and then pressed into panels. It is waterproof and needs no coatings or finishing; it is suitable primarily for interior use. The ash for the chair frame came from a tree which had been cut down in central London and was due for disposal. This is the only known example of the chair, since it has not proved viable for commercial manufacture.
Both Smile Plastics and Re-worked (now re-branded as Re-Factory) continue to be global leaders in the development and production of superior-quality materials from waste products.
Fairweather and Rawcliffe designed this chair as a prototype to highlight the potential for making furniture from sustainable materials. Curface is a high-impact, polystyrene thermoplastic board made from used coffee grounds, collected from offices, factories and cafes, combined with waste plastic and formed into pellets, and then pressed into panels. It is waterproof and needs no coatings or finishing; it is suitable primarily for interior use. The ash for the chair frame came from a tree which had been cut down in central London and was due for disposal. This is the only known example of the chair, since it has not proved viable for commercial manufacture.
Both Smile Plastics and Re-worked (now re-branded as Re-Factory) continue to be global leaders in the development and production of superior-quality materials from waste products.
Condition
Good
Materials
Recycled coffee bean and polystyrene thermoplastic board.
Ash.
Brass.
Ash.
Brass.
Physical Dimensions
H. 86
W. 48
D. 61
W. 48
D. 61
Marks
On rear of backrest: ‘Re-worked.co.uk. Curface from recycled coffee’.
Provenance
Acquired for the Collection c.2010.
