being human - statement of intent

As the title of this project is being human I will work towards making an item of furniture that fits to the contours of the human body, to do this I will need to research the sizes, weight of people and bone structure of the certain areas the piece I create will interact with. I want to create a style, which will begin to become a house style where it can be translated to different items simply that is recognisable. This relates well to my pathway stage as I will need to know this research for future projects although I do want to try and work in different ways to see how I work best and not constraining myself to my usual way.

I want to step away from my comfort zone of the Bauhaus and move on to a different time period, this time I’ve chosen the fifties with influences such as arne Jackson, verner panton and Charles eames. These artist are mainly from Denmark so will have more of a Scandinavian feel of plastics and plywood and materials that will mould, which work well with my idea of fitting the contours of the body. From this I can look at modern day furniture that have the same kind of influences and how they are made now, also how body sizes have changed, does this change how they are made?

To create the style I’m wanting, I’m going to have to improvise with different materials such as plaster/ plaster bandage, along side materials such as wire, paper and heated plastic. The reason for this is that we don’t have the materials for this and I would struggle to make the real life thing, but I will be making models and stating the measurements of the life sized piece and what it would be manufactured out of. To do this I would need to translate my ideas on to Photoshop/ illustrator, as this is how it would be done if I were to send it to be made. A lot of the materials I plan to use do have safety procedures such as plaster needing the ventilation fan on and gloves and eye wear for cutting wire. Most of my time to begin with will be used for designing and developing the style I want to work in a long side the research and towards the end with be when I become more physical in the way I work, creating models.


To make sure I’m on the right track with my work I will ensure that I keep an up to date reflective practice book writing in it when ever I do a piece of work and describe how I will move on to develop it. I will also invite other student to look at my work and give me feedback, as this will broaden my research as well as helping my evaluations.