Inga Sempé presents her latest creation for Ligne Roset, the Ruché settee.

“To design one settee is difficult enough. To design another one for a company for whom you have already designed one - that’s even trickier. After Moël (2007), which belongs to the ‘all-foam’ family of seating, I wanted to take a completely different approach: a settee lifted from the ground by a simple, fine structure which supports a comfortable seat. I was, at the outset, inspired by swing seats, the kind of rocking seats which one brings out in the garden in summertime, made from tubing and fabric, which possess a lightness I like very much. Like them, Ruché combines rigidity and flexibility, with airy looks and sparing use of materials. Ruché’s structure is in solid beech, either stained or natural. I wanted to offer a version in natural beech: natural wood is beautiful, qualitative, authentic; it’s modern, and at the same time restful, for it is one of the rare natural elements which one can have in a living room. The angles of the feet are worked ‘en congé’, which both refines them and protects the grain of the wood from shocks. Upon its slim legs rests a thick mattress with distinctive quilting, a kind of boutis stitch or padding made using a cross- hatching of interrupted seams. Alternately flattened by the stitches then set free, the fabric ‘curls’ in places, giving rise both to its unique appearance and to its name, ‘Ruché’ (a gathered or pleated fabric which serves as decoration on a piece of clothing). The highlights arising from these changes in level are very rich and their shading varies depending on the fabric used. A plain cloth is enriched with reliefs, a velour captures light from every angle... this quilting, simple and finely-worked, was the subject of much research and many trials, at the outset on my little sewing machine at my agency, then in the prototyping shop in Briord, on the seamstresses’ professional-grade machines, and finally there were tests on the programmed sewing robot with which the settees were to be produced. For Ligne Roset, Ruché also brings together the unusual and the traditional. The unusual thing about this piece is its solid wood structure, and the great traditional element: the quilting, the very heart of its savoir-faire. Its rangy uprights and the undulations of its duvet combine to produce a harmonious union or rigorous straight lines and soft, welcoming curves. Slender and fine, Ruché is nonetheless soft and welcoming. Its internal structure, its filling materials and its quilting were brought together and developed with a view to offering great comfort. Since the height of its armrests is the same as that of its back, one can just as easily sit sideways and stretch out one’s legs: as a major refinement, the armrest is mounted on elastic webbing to enable to sitter to lean back in the greatest possible comfort. As well as the 2 and 3-seat versions, footstool and classic 1-arm settee, Ruché is also offered in a 1-arm settee version with integral table surface at the end of its seat. This might accommo- date a tray, books, a lamp, DVD projector... It is a new departure which could, for example, enable a narrow room to enjoy the benefits of a low table with no inconvenient loss of space.” Inga Sempé