PP Smith

I started this side project in February 2020 in preparation for a furniture making internship (which sadly didn’t happen due to Covid-19). The goal was to refine my prototyping and physical making skills, but this has ultimately been tricky without access to workshop space.

However, nil desperandum as they say. I adapted my approach and experimented in different ways - creating cardboard prototypes, learning about natural wood dyeing and developing my digital sketching and rendering skills. I am excited to continue this project and eventually build it for myself (after some more development and exploration!)

Scroll to check out the progress so far.

As of October 2020, the first prototype is still going strong as a handy plant stand.

Here are a selection of process shots documenting the cardboard prototype. I made this prototype with shortened legs due to constraints with the cardboard sheet dimensions - it would building full-length legs to fully understand the intended stool size.

I created some digital sketches of an early version of the stool as a way to improve my digital sketching abilities. This was also a good way to experiment with different colours, wood textures and connecting joints. Physical prototyping would allow me to explore tactility too.

Without access to a workshop, I wanted to visualise aspects of the stool quickly without using CAD. I particularly like the ebonies wood in the third image - the joint here mirrors the profile of the leg to create a subtle cohesion within the stool aesthetic. The dimensions and capabilities of this joint would have to be tested to validate its function, and iterated upon to achieve the best solution.

Encouraged by the idea of dark or stained wood, I wanted to investigate different ways of achieving this effect using natural dyes - as this is something easily accessible to most people (many of the ingredients can be found in the home). I had varying levels of success - coffee worked very well, although it required multiple coats which was time-consuming. Other successes included raspberry and turmeric, however red cabbage did not achieve the depth of colour I desired. Overall, I really enjoyed delving into this subject, but found that the process was slow and inconsistent. It also proved a challenge to apply the dye to the wood without over-saturating the wood fibres.