Tuesday 14 April 2009

Round and round we go



Circleback Chair by Edwin Lutyens

This chair was designed in 1930 for two of the smaller bedrooms in the north west wing of Government House in New Delhi. Authoritative sources indicate that the original pieces do still survive and that they are now in the President of India's private apartment.

It is a good example of the paradoxical nature of much of Lutyens's work. While, on the face of it, we have a fairly conventional chair, there are certain aspects of the design that are surprising. The extravagant sweep of the semicircular arm is a case in point, as is the narrow void at the front of the seat. The degree to which the geometrical relationship between the circles of the back is precisely worked out is also of some interest. The reducing size of the voids is predetermined by a mathematical formula, as is the thickness of the rings which lessens as the circles become smaller.
- Candia Lutyens

----------------
Now playing on iTunes: The Cure - Round & Round & Round...
via FoxyTunes

4 comments:

columnist said...

It's a great design, but then again I'm a huge fan of his furniture and his architecture.

Easy and Elegant Life said...

It's the semi-circular arms that do it for me. We have a knock-off typical Lutyens bench in the back yard, but if I could find one of this design that fell off a truck...!

HOBAC said...

E&EL -
"fell off a truck...", a once much favoured saying here.

victoria thorne said...

love all this going 'round in circles you're doing...amazing, extravagant, and completely delightful...