Dezeen Magazine

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Designers reinterpret Ron Arad's Tom Vac chair

Clerkenwell Design Week 2014: in our second story today about Ron Arad, the London designer's Tom Vac chair has been reinterpreted by more than 20 design studios into forms including swings, speakers and a representation of an udder.

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Reely by BDP. Main image: the udder tom by M Moser Associates

The Tailor My Tom Vac exhibition during Clerkenwell Design Week will include pieces by 23 architects and designers who have each put their spin on Ron Arad's chair to mark its 15th birthday.

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Tom Vac On Off by Farrells

"It's very interesting to see other people taking the same idea and expressing their responses," said Arad. "Inspiration comes from strange places sometimes, so it's good to know that Tom Vac is being used as a starting point as well as being an end product."

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W2 5EZ by Allford Hall Monoghan Morris

Each group started with the corrugated polypropylene seat and tubular steel legs of the Vitra-produced chair to create the one-off pieces.

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Pamela by Hawkins Brown

Hawkins Brown has made a nod to TV show Baywatch by turning the seat into a lifeguard's chair, named Pamela after one of the show's best-known stars.

Move Over Rover by [re]designThe plastic element has been used as the seat for a four-wheeled kart made from two reclaimed wooden planks by [re]design.
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Move Over Rover by [re]design
The plastic element has been used as the seat for a four-wheeled kart made from two reclaimed wooden planks by [re]design.
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Those were the Days by HLW International Ltd with TMJ

Two groups have turned the chair into a swing: HLW International has used a wooden frame, while Morag Myerscough and Luke Morgan have suspended it from a metal structure and mechanism that turns a wooden board.

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King of the Swingers by Morag Myerscough and Luke Morgan

M Moser Associates added four upturned milk bottle forms to the seat, with white blobs dripping through the surface to look as if they are "feeding" four small versions of the chair positioned below.

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Fathom It! by Emulsion Architecture

Grey pool noodles have been squeezed through the hole in the plastic shell in the design by Emulsion Architecture.

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All Decked Out by Jump Studios with Millenium Models

Jump Studios and Millenium Models have used the seat to support a record player, Scott Brownrigg Ltd has moulded the curved form into a gramophone-shaped speaker for a smartphone dock and ID:SR has employed it to amplify the sound from a stereo.

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mVac+ don't sit, just listen... by Scott Brownrigg Ltd

Other contributors include Aecom, Morey Smith, Farrells, Allford Hall Monaghan Morris , El Ultimo Grito Studio and CJCT Studios.

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Get into the Groove '97 by ID:SR

Arad first designed the chair to stack 100 high for his Totem installation in Milan, commissioned by Italian magazine Domus in 1997. Vitra put the design into production two years later.

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Tom Vac: Atavism by CJCT Studios

The designs will go on display at Vitra's London showroom, 30 Clerkenwell Road, tomorrow until 22 May for Clerkenwell Design Week. The showroom is also hosting the launch of the Dezeen Book of Interviews tomorrow evening.

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The Reflect-On by Make Architects