NEWS & EVENTS

Bench systems have become one of the great office design success stories of the last few years, and Vitra has established itself as the pre-eminent exponent of the art.

With its Joyn and new Ad Hoc ranges, Vitra has truly set the benchmark in benching. There are few office furniture systems that provoke a gasp from visitors who see them for the first time, but Joyn is one of them. There is nothing remotely like it.

Designed by Rowan and Erwan Bouroullec, it is clean, pure, flexible, clever, and an absolute joy to behold. You will not find it easy to resist evolving your business to Joyn.

Joyn is not just a piece of office furniture, but a management tool for cultural change. With its mobile and modular structure is adapts spontaneously to changing demands and technologies. It initiates new, productive forms of work that are based on communication and cooperation. Joyn is as simple as the playful use of its parts, and as variable as the problems it helps to solve.

It is nothing short of a platform for collective intelligence.

The Joyn platform can be the entire office, or just one person's private domain. None of its boundaries are fixed, so work areas simply contract and expand as needed. Density varies with the level of activity. The capacity of rooms, floors, even whole buildings becomes extraordinarily elastic.

Joyn is a change manager's dream: it forces change, communication, and a new level of openness. It has helped management understand how the way the office is designed can be used to attract and retain employees.

Now this can also be said of Vitra's famous Ad Hoc system: the original bench system that has evolved into something capable of meeting almost all the needs of the modern office designer.

Ad Hoc is know for flexibility, combining shape, function and emotion, and embodies the concept of populating an office following the example of a town. Small and large constellations, different zones and areas create a diverse and functional office landscape. Thanks to the newest additions Ad Hoc can be individualised even further and through this becomes the ideal partner for the changing office.

New innovations include a connection bridge which allows for single tables to be connected into room-defining configurations. Also new is an intelligent cable channel that makes it possible to supply large desk configurations through only a few power and data access points. A new twin foot and geometrical table tops and desk returns offer more new possibilities.

To find out more about Joyn and Ad Hoc or to arrange to see them and experience them in the flesh, click here or call Hugh Sandeman in the Roundhere office on 01962 858290.

The Swedish manufacturer Lammhults has produced the world' first chair made entirely of Cellupress - a combination of pressed waste wood and plant fibres.

Called the Imprint Shell Chair it is supremely environmentally friendly and visually stunning. No two chairs are identical as different plant fibres produce different patterns and colours, in shades from light to dark.

The designers, Johannes Foersom and Peter Hiort-Lorenzen, chose pine and cellulose as the base for the shell, and then added plant fibres such as ordinary bark, coconut or oak. The way it looks is a combination of nature and technique. By moulding the Cellupress wood fibre material under high pressure, Lammhults has been able to produce a distinct seat form and a unique look.

The chair is available with two frame options: steel or wood, and two different models: one geometric and one more rounded in shape.

Lammhults hopes the thin, light chairs will also be used as an environmentally friendly alternative to plastic, which uses precious oil.

For more information on pricing and availability, call Mary Dorrington Ward in the Roundhere office on 01962 858290.