The American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC) has undertaken some demanding creative projects in the past. We’ve worked with some exceptional designers to push the boundaries of what’s possible technically and aesthetically with US hardwoods. The outcomes, from decorative products, to multistorey timber building, have been incredible.
But our latest project, Connected, has been a challenge – and consequently rewarding – on a different level. It’s simultaneously been about exploring the furniture design, manufacturing and market potential of US hardwoods – maple, cherry and red oak – and making the most sustainable use of the timber resource. At the same time it’s been a design and making response to the extraordinary environment of the Covid-19 pandemic. And it’s addressed what are increasingly seen as the longer term outcomes; a permanent shift to more remote working and the home becoming more of a living and working space, with the implications that has for the products and materials people want around them.
The results, which featured in a special exhibition at The Design Museum during the London Design Festival, would be exceptional at any time. In the current circumstances, they’re extraordinary.
Connected was so-called because it involved multiple connections. First it brought together nine designers in nine countries. Their brief has been to create co-ordinating seating and tables, with the ultimate aim of the pieces coming together in one installation. They’ve all worked from home in various levels of lockdown, but connected with us and each other remotely throughout the process
Their enthusiasm for the project blew us away. It was not just the creative challenge they relished. It was also being asked to adapt to a new way of working. Besides the brief, they were sent samples of the three species in a range of stains and finishes, plus full technical data. It was then a case of multiple WhatsApp, Zoom and FaceTime calls with our maker, renowned furniture producer Benchmark. This way they navigated each step of bringing the designs to reality. For those designers who quarantine rules allowed to get to the exhibition, it was the first time they’d seen their pieces in the flesh.
It was a journey into the unknown. That it worked so well was down to the imagination and creativity of the designers, the versatility of the material and the timber knowledge and crafts skills of Benchmark founder Sean Sutcliffe and his team.
The project also aimed to connect the design world with these three species, maple, cherry and red oak.
They’re less used in Europe than in the past and, as they’re among the most abundant varieties in the US hardwood forest – with red oak the most prolific of all – we as an industry naturally want to sell more. We make no bones about that.
But there’s also an irrefutable environmental case for utilising a wider selection of timber and we made that from the start of Connected. To make sustainable use of the forest resource, we have to accept what it provides. We can’t keep consuming more of the same handful of species.
We put together the range of samples to encourage the designers to explore the untapped potential of this palette of species, not feel hide-bound by what they’ve been used for in the past. And boy, did they rise to the occasion. They used the wood finished in a variety of ways, stained, painted, lacquered.
Some used a single variety, others a blend, or they married the timber with other materials entirely.
What further differentiates Connected from previous AHEC projects was that we weren’t asking designers to work to someone else’s specification, but to create something for themselves. It had to be furniture they would feel comfortable having in their own home, a home, moreover, that post-Covid and, it’s increasingly understood, in response to the climate crisis, will have to be more multifunctional and lower environmental impact.
Finally, what Connected has emphatically demonstrated is how these hardwoods enable designers to respond individually to a brief, not just aesthetically, but technically. It’s shown that, with the combination of the material, creativity, skill and technology anything is possible. The timber has been subjected to the range of processes; from traditional hand crafting to state-of-theart CNC machining. It’s been finely turned, moulded, steam bent and laminated.
The end results range from Thomas Heatherwick’s glass desk and the biophilic lines of its turned maple legs, which blossom organically into plant holders, to Jaime Hayon’s multi-functional Mesamachine, which pushes the boundaries of classical joinery, featuring extensions, shelves, hidden drawers and fold-outs. Sean Sutcliffe describes it as the Swiss army knife of furniture.
Following The Design Museum exhibition we’re now communicating the Connected experience digitally worldwide. We’re also planning in 2021 to take the collection to some of its creators’ home cities. With them as our ambassadors and the calibre of their creations, we’re confident we’ll really be able to reach out to other designers and strengthen the connection between timber industry and design community. More than ever, Connected has convinced us this is the way ahead for our sector.
