When most individuals embark on buying furniture, they evaluate the design, style, or level of usefulness and comfort. However, design now entails more than just meeting the basic demands of the consumer, and product design has broken through so many barriers established in the past that there is no longer a style line in this market. One may argue that today’s commodities have adapted to the demands and tastes of all types of people and feature a design appropriate for everyone.
The following collection includes furniture that is at the very least contentious, if not completely strange and peculiar. We invite you to a universe with no limitations, and your creativity can go beyond your wildest thoughts. Here are some of the most unusual furniture designs you’ve ever seen, and maybe you’d be tempted to include them when setting up your home office.
The Metamorphosis by Tadeas Podracky
Tadeas Podracky, a Design Academy Eindhoven alumnus, ignored formal design processes when designing these unique furniture pieces, which he created by layering elements like “a bird making her nest.” Podracky made the Rietveld chair out of wood, then covered it in layers of white, black, and yellow paint before chopping away at it with a chainsaw.
Concrete Melt Chair by Bower Studios
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Bower Studios’ liquid-effect chair has a pale concrete top, draping over a steel base and folds on the floor. Bower Studios intended to make the concrete appear to be melting over its foundation structure to give the solid element a fluidity that isn’t normally associated with it.
Maximalist Furniture by Messgewand
Messgewand studio’s Alexis Bondoux and Romain Coppin created a series of bizarre furniture out of waste and found things such as wood, foam, metal, and plastic. The designers assembled a “collage” of random elements before adding ornamentation, surface work, paint, and decorative details to make each piece. The resulting designs contrast the highly polished items developed by most designers for mass production.
Soft Cabinets by Dewi van de Klomp
Dewi van de Klomp, a Dutch designer, created these squishy, warping shelves out of pink and green foam rubber – a material commonly used for wall insulation and cushioning in car seats. The Soft Cabinets change shape based on what’s inside, twisting and sagging as books, plates, periodicals, or glasses are stored inside.
Ultima Thule by Stiliyana Minkovska
Stiliyana Minkovska, a London-based architect, created three innovative birthing chairs to help women during various phases of labor. The Ultima Thule chair collection attempts to provide “hostile” hospital maternity wards. The Solace Chaise is intended for usage during recuperation or postpartum, and it is partially enclosed to provide the mother with seclusion.
A Wild Sheep Chaise; Dolphin Hotel Club Chair by EJR Barnes
EJR Barnes enclosed this cuboid-shaped chair in Venetian blinds fitted into the back and sides and framed in cork. Strip lights disguised behind the blinds softly illuminate the chair, creating the illusion of something behind them. Barnes’ chair is only one of several designs he develops with “a wry smile.”
Envisioned Comfort by Vytautas Gečas and Marija Puipaitė
Tufted, pink velvet chairs droop over interconnected wooden dowels in Vytautas Geas and Marija Puipait’s Envisioned Comfort furniture line. The dowels are cut to various lengths to create undulating, ergonomic surfaces that conform to the shape of the user’s body. The more poles put into the construction, the more complex the curves.
Rockito Seat by Duyi Han and Thomas Musca
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Duyi Han and Thomas Musca took inspiration from brutalist architecture when designing this reinforced, squashed-looking concrete bench, part of a larger collection of bulky furniture pieces. The Rockito bench was designed as an abstract spin on the typical rocking rocker, with a sharply curved seat and eight voids that resemble a squished set of shelves.
Mother of Pearl Furniture by Plasticiet
Plasticiet, a Dutch business, stretched and kneaded slabs of recycled polycarbonate plastic-like taffy to create the Mother of Pearl furniture, which has a swirling, glittering appearance reminiscent of the natural material after which the line is called. The designers wanted the collection to give new life to recycled plastic, and the final monolithic forms are inspired by prehistoric human-made stone artifacts from the Stone Age’s last stages.
Foame Chair by Bonnie Hvillum
Bonnie Hvillum’s Foame chair was featured in the Ukurant Objects exhibition at this year’s 3 Days of Design event in Copenhagen. The rough chair appears to be made of a shiny black stone from a distance. Still, it is composed of a squishy, biodegradable charcoal foam composite designed by the designer.
Abstraction Chair by WoongKi Ryu
Each aspect of this chair was inspired by the brilliant colors and graphic shapes shown in abstract paintings of twentieth-century artist Wassily Kandinsky, according to Korean designer WoongKi Ryu.
The Abstraction chair purposely prioritizes form over utility, with a backrest made of numerous splaying metal rods and a cone-shaped oak seat. Instead of focusing on the chair’s functional use, Ryu emphasized the chair’s meaning and emotion, which could only be portrayed abstractly. The designer intended to emulate Kandinsky’s approach to abstraction in his paintings.
Bel Air Armchair by Peter Shire
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The 1982 Bel Air chair by Californian ceramist and designer Peter Shire was one of the most notable contributions to the Italian collaborative created by Ettore Sottsass in the 1980s. The pattern made up of numerous forms in opposing hues was part of David Bowie’s private Memphis collection. The asymmetrical item is described as “almost an anti-chair” by Adam Trunoske, a twentieth-century design expert at Sotheby’s London auction house.
It has only a few flat lines, leaving you wondering, “How am I supposed to sit on that?” or “Where should I sit?” It challenges conventional notions of what a chair should be.
Slip Chair by Snarkitecture
While the seat of this chair is completely level, it is intended to appear crooked and thus unusable. Snarkitecture in New York designed the Slip chair. It includes an off-center frame made of white ash wood with a marble seat carved at an angle to counterbalance its leaning structure and provide a level surface.
Carlton Bookcase by Ettore Sottsass
The Carlton bookcase, created by Italian architect Ettore Sottsass for his Memphis Group in 1981, is his most recognizable furniture design. Its confusing form, made of multicolored, random slabs of laminated medium-density fiberboard (MDF), could be construed as a bookcase, a dresser, a room divider, or simply a decorative object. Sottsass’ aim to break away from the constraints of functionalism is reflected in the design.