Minale-Maeda: Inside Out Furniture

In Rotterdam, Mario Minale and Kuniko Maeda continue to examine the production process of everyday objects in their attempt to redefine it according to new parameters: the logistics of materials, construction, transport and storage.

In times of re-questioning the design field, studio Minale-Maeda is pursuing an examination of established industrial production methods with photographic precision. Taking inspiration from what lies behind the scenes of a mass consumption society, Mario Minale and Kuniko Maeda give attention to the production process of common goods, and propose an alternative to the place these everyday products have in the complex system of a material economy. In response to the hermetic nature of the factory, their designs attempt to expose the origins of their making and question the design field in general.

With their Inside Out Furniture series, Minale-Maeda are on their way to redefining the design field and opening it up to the consumer. Inside Out Furniture proposes an alternative solution to making and buying affordable, good-looking chairs, tables and benches outside of mass production.

The Inside Out Furniture pieces are easy assemblies of standard wooden beams and sheets, put together with the simple logic of placing one part on top of the other, and kept together with plastic connections that show off the beauty of these simple geometries. As a design project, apart from the clever aesthetics of joinery, Inside Out Furniture is best understood as an effort to redesign a production system, and not as new furniture design. The series proposes to rethink the logistics of the material resources, manufacturing, transport, storage and demand involved in mass production. A key element in the vision of Minale-Maeda is that the designs of their pieces are downloadable and the furniture is produced locally, using readily available wooden parts and 3D-printed joints. As the parts needed to make an Inside Out chair are resources that can be found almost anywhere, at any time, the chair's availability does not depend on whether it will be made or not. From this perspective, the project not only proposes the production of an affordable, easy-to-like piece of furniture, but also gives the consumer the opportunity to ask, "Do I want this chair?" before it has even been made.
Top: Views of Minale-Maeda’s
studio, housed in a former
customs warehouse at the
Port of Rotterdam. Objects
and materials are carefully
catalogued by project,
typology and thematic
inspiration. Above: <em>Notgeld</em>. Tablecloths,
kitchen towels and napkins
Top: Views of Minale-Maeda’s studio, housed in a former customs warehouse at the Port of Rotterdam. Objects and materials are carefully catalogued by project, typology and thematic inspiration. Above: Notgeld. Tablecloths, kitchen towels and napkins
As downloadable design, Inside Out Furniture is produced on demand and can exist in endless digital variations, without any investment in its possible production. The designer is as free to change his collection as the consumer is free to choose what suits him. Such a relationship between market and production goes beyond the conventional supply and demand model. Since the supply does not need to anticipate a demand, there is no pressure for designs to be produced in mass quantities to compensate for large financial investments in material resources, production, transport and storage. This new relationship between design, production and consumption simply deletes the existing model of mass production. It is not the furniture that is turned inside out, but the factory that is put in complete reverse.
Mario Minale and Kuniko
Maeda in their studio in
Rotterdam. They graduated
from Wuppertal and Tokyo,
respectively, and began
working together in 2006,
after gaining their master’s
degrees at Design Academy
Eindhoven
Mario Minale and Kuniko Maeda in their studio in Rotterdam. They graduated from Wuppertal and Tokyo, respectively, and began working together in 2006, after gaining their master’s degrees at Design Academy Eindhoven
This consideration highlights the revolution brought about with projects such as Minale-Maeda's Inside Out Furniture. The design field is changed into a virtual platform for possible products and solutions, where design thinking can progress without any hindrance from the industrial establishment that created the designer's job in the first place. In this way, design becomes a reaction to cultural tendencies and is not there to adjust to what we ask from it, but becomes itself the articulation of this question.

In a fashionable statement-like manner, Minale-Maeda capture ideas concerned with consumerist behaviour. Using 3D-printing technology as the virtual counterpart to the laborious and exhaustive factory, their work provides us with footage of photographic quality, such as the white synthetic plants from the Virtual Florist series, in which we can instantly recognise a preference for paradoxical commentary and a clever application of questioning design.
In a fashionable statement-like manner, Minale-Maeda capture ideas concerned with consumerist behaviour
Structural detail of the
<em>Inside Out</em> table, made of
standard wooden beams and
sheets held together with
plastic connections. The
concept was to turn the pieces
inside out to simplify their
construction, while brackets
and structural elements
become distinctive features
Structural detail of the Inside Out table, made of standard wooden beams and sheets held together with plastic connections. The concept was to turn the pieces inside out to simplify their construction, while brackets and structural elements become distinctive features
Vanity Charms, designed by the duo in 2011, further exemplifies how the designers seek to comprehend the relationship between what we need and what we make. The collection of miniature replicas of luxury goods humorously understates material needs in a society of abundance, carefully understanding the virtual qualities of 3D-printing technology as a means to materialise the purely symbolic value of desirable products.
Proofs and polyester colours for
<em>Slideshow Mirror</em>, which reflects
only part of the light spectrum
Proofs and polyester colours for Slideshow Mirror, which reflects only part of the light spectrum
With a playful concern for technological possibilities, Minale- Maeda comment on both production and perception, delivering designs that illustrate design thinking. Toying with their knowledge of production, their work essentially exhibits what goes on behind the scenes of industry and is generally not presented visibly in a product. Inspired by banknote patterns, the Notgeld household fabrics exhibit the complex graphics that were used to protect paper money from counterfeiting, pointing to the double agenda of these aesthetics. While nowadays banknotes are equipped with invisible elements concealed in the paper, Minale-Maeda use the visible patterns that remain from earlier protection mechanisms as a design for textiles. The Notgeld fabrics interweave the use value and the exchange value of common domestic products.
View of Minale-Maeda’s
studio, housed in a former
customs warehouse at the
Port of Rotterdam
View of Minale-Maeda’s studio, housed in a former customs warehouse at the Port of Rotterdam
In their earlier works such as Chroma Key, the designers showed their interest in unveiling the true nature of a product. Inspired by the blue screen used in photography and cinematography, the Chroma Key furnishings place the attention on this concealing technique, using it to partially obscure their classic upholstery and half-finished archetypical shapes.
Like film stock, <em>Slideshow
Mirror</em> reflects only part of
the light spectrum and create
a gentle colour hue in the
mirror image
Like film stock, Slideshow Mirror reflects only part of the light spectrum and create a gentle colour hue in the mirror image
Their latest project Slideshow Mirror clearly embodies the duo's design spirit. By showing a series of mirrors that reflect different colour spectra compared to the common silver mirror, Minale-Maeda touch upon a product that itself is a tool of perception, and in this case it not only shows our mirror image, but also mirrors our understanding of common things. The pastel-coloured world of Minale-Maeda revolves around issues of materiality and value in our society of overconsumption, which with their illustrative commentary become questions we would like to ask ourselves. Elise van Mourik, design curator and writer
CAD/CAM Tableware. Porcelain tableware
resembling machine parts. Photo by Studio Minale-Maeda
CAD/CAM Tableware. Porcelain tableware resembling machine parts. Photo by Studio Minale-Maeda
Left: <em>Notgeld</em>. Tablecloths,
kitchen towels and napkins
inspired by banknote patterns. Right: <em>Inside Out Furniture</em>, designed to be downloaded,
3D-printed and assembled locally
Left: Notgeld. Tablecloths, kitchen towels and napkins inspired by banknote patterns. Right: Inside Out Furniture, designed to be downloaded, 3D-printed and assembled locally
Proofs and polyester colours for
<em>Slideshow Mirror</em>, which reflects
only part of the light spectrum
Proofs and polyester colours for Slideshow Mirror, which reflects only part of the light spectrum
<em>Virtual Florist</em>. Rapidprototyped
flowers
Virtual Florist. Rapidprototyped flowers

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