Story | Zu Hui Photography | Front Design
Swedish design team Front Design has applied its futuristic vision, in conjunction with Italian brand Moroso, to a furniture collection. Design by Nature uses technology to recreate natural elements, from rocks to mosses.
Front and Moroso’s Design by Nature sofa imitates mossy rock formation.
And the pieces are full of fun. The design team worked with Moroso and used cutting-edge 3D scanning technology to make furniture pieces that look like weathered seaside landscapes, tree moss and even algae-covered rocks among other naturescapes.
Their designs aren’t about making a sofa upholstered in realistic printed patterns. Instead, the design team wants to bring the look of a rock in the wild into the living room—“to create the feeling that someone had lifted a whole glade from a forest with a gigantic shovel and moved it in a home,” says Front Design co-founder Sofia Lagerkvist.
The chairs that look like algae-covered rocks are among other naturescapes.
The collection has been four years in the making. It’s not about producing a rock-like sofa, but how to use nature to enhance well-being. Perhaps it’s the Scandinavian heritage, but Front Design believes the natural environment is part of its core, that being closer to nature is soothing, and good for the mind and soul. Designers even study how animals pick and build their habitats, and then apply their findings to furniture design.
Each sofa in the Design by Nature collection is rich in texture, with layers of fabrics in different tones.
For production, Front Design uses traditional drawing methods, as well as photography. The wooden frame of the sofa is sculpted by machines into silhouettes of undulating rocks. The fabrics are made by Dutch textile firm Febrik, using the latest printing and weaving methods to emulate moss green and algae on rocks. Other fabrics are woven with threads in different shades of blue to reproduce the texture of seaside rocks. Each sofa in the Design by Nature collection is rich in texture, with layers of fabrics in different tones.
The fabrics are made by using the latest printing and weaving methods to emulate moss green and algae on rocks.
Utilizing silhouettes found in nature, Design by Nature’s sofas are like sitting out in the wild.
The Resting Animals collection designed for Vitra is in harmony with the brand’s previous animal pieces.When Vitra, a German design company with a spotlight on sustainable thinking and action, engaged Front Design to produce home furnishings, the latter decided to create a series of decorative animals to inject nature into homes. There are pieces made in wool or ceramics, in the form of a lazy bear, a curledup cat and a pair of dozing birds. The bear, a chair as well as a recliner, is made with the latest 3D weaving technique that’s gone through numerous tests to determine the most realistic texture and colour changes.
The high-tech 3D bear reflects the vivid effects achieved by colourful weaving, Vitra Resting Bear mauve, approximately €900
The Resting Animals collection designed for Vitra is in harmony with the brand’s previous animal pieces.
Front Design has a long history of making animal-shaped furniture. In 2006, it created the 1.1 Animal Thing collection for Dutch brand Moooi: that included a piglet coffee table as well as horse-head and rabbit-head lamps. In another project for Swedish brand Åbyparken, Front Design used animal sculptures to create a 1950s garden. The designers dotted the property with what were regarded by some as “tacky” bronze animal garden sculptures to keep people company and create a peaceful landscape.
Front Design is known for using animals to create fun.
