Characters

I had the pleasure of including Vancouver's Straight Line Designs in my coverage of the show last year, but this is another company I will always keep up with, because Judson Beaumont's work is always so imaginative and fun.  Here's some of the new stuff he has this year.

This is "Canned Seat":

A sardine can, and I love that the key provides a little tabletop.  It's so Oldenberg.  This totally reminds me of that store Think Big.  Does anybody remember that from the '80s?  I used to love that store.

A major theme for Beaumont would seem to be pieces that are destroyed, broken, or are self-destructing--so here's the "Oops Cabinet" that he was displaying at the show:

Not at the show, but a new item I noticed on the website, "Sobey Dressers":

At first glance I liked this because it looks like a row of little buildings.  But it's really in the subtle details.  All the drawers have one knob, like shirt buttons, except for the top one, which has two, like eyes.  And they're all smiling.  I've said it before, but this is another case where if your furniture smiling at you doesn't make your day just a little more pleasant, I'd say you can't possibly have a very good sense of humor.

But the thing I think I was most delighted to discover at their booth this year is that they've started working with ceramics.  Here's their new Vase:

So the flowers are like faces.  Awesome.  They had some all white ones that they'd evidently baked RIGHT before the show, and I guess they don't have images of them, yet.  I think I preferred those, because in all white, you maybe don't notice right away what they are.  In fact, I had to see it from the side, actually, to notice that it was a shoulder and arm with hand-in-pocket.  That moment of discovery was just great, though.

I guess maybe I have a thing for anthropomorphized design objects, but those are really fun, so I'm not apologizing.

Straight Line Designs

(BC) 604-251-9669

©2008, Ryan Witte