31 Customized Panton Chairs For Vitra In Honor Of The 50th Anniversary.

above: HKS International turned the chair on its side, transforming it into a glacier, complete with Polar Bear

The modern classic iconic Panton chair , shown below, designed by Verner Panton just celebrated it's 50th anniversary.



In honor of the anniversary Vitra UK launched a national Panton Chair Competition and asked architects and designers to reinterpret the modern chair. Some treated is as art, others made it interactive. The winning design was an entry from Jump Studios and the 2nd and 3rd place winners were Ben Adams and Maris Interiors, respectively. Entries ran the gamut and included everything from Post-It note covered to Swarovski crystal studded versions.

Here are all the entries.

Winner, Jump Studios:

2nd Place Winner, Ben Adams:

3Sphere and Aukett Fitzroy-Robinson:

Amalgam and Aram:

Day 2 Interiors:

Forme and Foster & Partners:

Gensler and Harmsen:

HLW Architects and HOK International:

3rd place winner, Maris Interiors:

Pascall & Watson and Inskip jenkins:

MCM Architecture:

Pret A Manger and Pringle Brandon:

Ridgestone and Schneider Designers:

Scott Brownrigg:

Sheppard Robson and Sketch Studios:

Staffan Tollgard:

The Lollipop Shoppe and Walker Martin:

Workspirit and Woods Bagot:

Yoo Design:

HKS International's entry is shown at the top of this post.

All 31 entries were auctioned on 1st July 2010 and the proceedings of about £10,000 were passed onto Shelter.

The judge’s panel included:
Charles Saatchi
TV presenter Kevin McCloud
Designer Terence Conran

all original photos (cropped for this post) by Nicole Bachmann © Vitra UK

Happy 4th Of July! A Patriotic Promotion From DWR

To remind potential buyers of their holiday promotion (free shipping through July 4th) Design Within Reach e-mailed out this patriotic email to their customers and subscribers that features the American flag made up of modern chairs. This is the second year in a row they've created their 'modern' version of Old Glory.

This year, 2009, they used the Eames shell chair with Eiffel tower base, the Bubble Club outdoor chair and the Bantam Armchair to make up the flag:



The three chairs used in the above art are all available for purchase from DWR:


above: Eames® Molded Plastic Side Chair, available here.
above: Bubble Club Armchair by Philipe Starck, available here.
above: the Bantam Armchair, available here.

Last year's version (2008) featured the Panton chair in blue, the Arne Jacobsen Swan chair in red and the molded Eames Chair in white:



And once again, the chairs from the 2008 DWR flag are all available for purchase:


above: Eames® Molded Plastic Side Chair, available here.
above: Panton chair, available here
above: Arne Jacobsen Swan Chair, available here

I just love them and thought they'd be the perfect way to wish you all a happy Fourth of July!

Shop Design Within Reach and take advantage of their free shipping offer through July 4th now.