Each piece of furniture in Oskar Zieta's 3+ collection is constructed from hollow plates of white, black or grey powder-coated steel or raw galvanised steel, which is suitable for outdoor use.

As well as enabling users to combine elements in many different configurations, the holes across the metal surfaces help to keep laptops cool and cables neatly organised.

The plates can be used horizontally as office, workshop or dining tables, or vertically for displays and shelving systems or as magnetic boards.

They come in four thicknesses, with the thickest having three rows of holes on its edges and the thinnest having none.

Other elements include wooden and metal legs to build tables and shelves and an L-shaped sheet that can be mounted on a table as a space divider.

The furniture can be built with the connectors designed by Zieta or with standard screws, so users can take the pieces apart and make their own combinations.

The furniture is already in production and will be presented next month in Milan at the MOST exhibition and at EDIT by designjunction from 9 to 14 April – see all news and products from Milan this year.

Zieta's previous work includes a bulging metal stool formed by inflating its legs with fluid – see all projects by Oskar Zieta.

Other metal furniture we've published includes Thomas Heatherwick's aluminium furniture made by the world's largest extrusion machine and a series of tables and shelves on 3D-printed metal legs – see all design in metal.

Photographs are by Jedrzej Stelmaszek, Paulina Sikorska and Zieta Prozessdesign.

Here's some more information from the designer:

3+ Collection

The office, workshop, kitchen, lounge room and retail are all stationary, yet characterised by mobile function. They tend to follow the contemporary user.

3+ technology reinvents its function every day with every interaction. It becomes an ultra-light construction for the every day, thanks to its strong, innovative and minimalistic features, which you create. In our collection we offer chairs, tables, shelving, but we don’t want to categorise them as office or dining chairs, workshop or kitchen tables, because it is you, that creates their function. Thanks to a simple system of connectors and versatile elements you are able to give each product a new context, function or even create new ones from scratch. Each perforation is a starting point to satisfy your personal needs, accommodating products to new situations and tasks.

3+ is work, hobby and leisure. It is customisation, lifestyle, space – it’s always current, and ready to answer the requirements of change.

Dynamic businesses in which teams outgrow space and new tasks require constant adaptation of office arrangements require flexible and modular solutions. 3+ offers the stability of steel construction required by warehouse or workshop context, as well as the aesthetic appeal essential in a modern office or retail space. While creating the ultra-light, flexible, modular and mobile 3+ system we considered studies about the nomadic lifestyle of the modern human. In the more intimate personal sphere we continue to further exploit our access to mobility, we expand our professional skills allowing us to take on new more challenges. This entails moving from place to place as well as changing our immediate personal space.

Milan 2013 - Salone Internazionale del Mobile

During the Salone Internazionale del Mobile this year Zieta Prozessdesign, design and engineering studio established by Oskar Zieta, will be launching in the exhibition space at the MOST museum at Olona in Milan a new system of modular furniture 3+. This is not only name of collection, but especialy a new innovative technology of stabilisation of thin metal sheets 3+. At the stand also will be present ultralight and bionic furniture made in FiDU technology invented by Oskar Zieta too. You will can take a part in production process and make your own product!

We will exhibit our products at designlink.pl as part of EDIT at designjunction too.

Exhibition and Guide on Polish Design, Milan Salone 2013 at Edit by designjunction is organized by the Creative Project Foundation in partnership with Adam Mickiewicz Institute, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Poland.

Zieta exhibition at MOST is Powered by Adam Mickiewicz Institute/www.culture.pl

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As the workplace for creative agency Hypernuit, the office occupies a ground floor unit that is visible to the street through floor-to-ceiling shop windows.

h2o Architectes were asked to create workspaces for five people, plus a small meeting room. "The refurbishment project had to reflect the dynamic and innovative spirit of the agency with a serene and contemporary space," explain the architects.

The muted grey blocks come in a mixture of shapes and sizes, and are piled up around the room to define separate areas for each occupant. Shelves surround the desks to offer seclusion, but each one also faces out into a central corridor.

"The balance of these elements and the different scenarios help to define hierarchy and priorities," the architects told Dezeen. "The modules have different shapes and proportions so that they can be used for as many functions as you can imagine."

The white interiors of the blocks give a second tone to the plain grey furnishings, offering a simple backdrop to the colourful books, plants and stationary that were inevitably added afterwards.

As well as the usual storage areas, the space incorporates display boards for temporary photography exhibitions.

All of the modular parts were constructed in the workshop then assembled on site to ensure a speedy construction process. The arrangement can also be reconfigured to adapt to future needs and changes.

Architects Charlotte Hubert and Jean-Jacques Hubert launched h2o Architectes in 2005. Antoine Santiard joined them in 2008 and the team have since completed an apartment in Paris for a comic-strip collector and a garden pavilion where furniture forms the entire interior. See more architecture by h2o Architectes.

Photography is by Julien Attard.

Here's a project description from h2o Architectes:

Hypernuit Offices, Paris

Context

The project takes place on the ground floor of a building of flats, behind a large window looking out onto the Clignancourt Street. The office space to create has a single orientation; it is a well-lit, plainly treated volume with a simple geometry. The commission consisted in fitting-out an office space including five identical desks, a common meeting room and shared facilities.

Hypernuit is an agency employing different people as artistic directors, graphic designers and workers in public relations. The refurbishment project had to reflect the dynamic and innovative spirit of the agency with a serene and contemporary space.

It also had to include a maximum of shelving for storage, the creation of exhibition walls for the display of photography shows. The schedule for the building works was very tight.

h2o architectes created for these offices a sort of indoor landscape thanks to a play with blocks.

These volumes of varied form and size constitute the living space for each person working there. Their adjunction and combination help compose the furniture, the desks, the separation and exhibition walls, the coffers etc.

The different parts were made in a workshop to save time on the building-site. The unitary treatment of the floor and of the furniture responds to the demand of a serene atmosphere.

The space is enlivened by the white color of the thickness of the different blocks and of course by the books and objects brought by each user. Each desk benefits from both openness towards the shared space and a more private area which can be modeled by a play with void and volume.

Design Architects: h2o architectes
Program: Development of an office space for five desks, meeting room and shared facilities
Location: 72 Rue Clignancourt, Paris 18th, France
Client: Private, Hypernuit
Area: 65m²
Date: Delivered January 2013

Above: floor plan

Above: cross section

Above: 3D model view one

Above: 3D model view two

Above: typical modular desk units

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by h2o Architectes appeared first on Dezeen.

Above: movie shows various configurations of the modules

Created for Japanese office furniture and supplies brand Kokuyo, the Brackets sofa and table units by Nendo are intended to surround their users "like parentheses."

The seven sofa types and four table types can be combined into numerous combinations, from rows of alternately facing single seats to compact meeting booths.

At 140 centimetres tall, the backrests screen the occupants and provide privacy as well as dampening surrounding noise.

Other products launched by Nendo recently include bent wood chairs that flick out as if they're wearing capes and a series of 30 lamps made from a modular set of parts – see all design by Nendo.

Earlier this month we reported on the studio's mountain range of laser-cut foamboard installed at Stockholm Design Week, where Nendo was guest of honour – see all news and products from Stockholm 2013.

Photographs by Akihiro Yoshida.

Here's some more information from the designers:

Brackets

An office-use unit sofa designed to create a communication space by 'bracketing' its inhabitants like parentheses.

Users can freely combine the seven sofa types and four table types into a variety of spaces with a finely tuned balance of openness and privacy, concentration and relaxation and individuals and groups.

The sofas are composed of sharp outer lines and softer inner curves, so that they respect the mood of the office environment while providing for user comfort.

The height of the backrests, relatively tall at 1400mm, provides visual privacy and dampens the surrounding noise, allowing for focussed conversations.

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St-Ely is a collaboration between industrial designer Eugenie Manseau and architect Hubert Pelletier. The seating has been launched by Lerival, an American design house that connects furniture design with architecture.

The design was inspired by the comfortable, angled back of old 1920s and 1930s couches and combined with the orthogonal rigidity of contemporary furniture.

Folding the ends of each module creates an angle between the back and sides, which the designers liken to ears.

"Most modular sofas are a continuous piece sliced up," Pelletier said to Dezeen. "We wanted to subtly stress the idea of the individual units and the act of combining these units together."

"The fold at each end is the dominant detail of the design and creates a repetitive motif when many units are assembled," he continued.

A key consideration for St-Ely was the impact of the piece on the surrounding space: "A large piece of furniture like a sofa can be used to articulate the architectural space, divide rooms and underline functional transitions in space."

"We think the back view is as important as the front or side view. By expressing the fold on the back side we created a formal detail that is coherent with the front view and that animates the back side," Pelletier added.

More modular seating we have featured on Dezeen includes triangular sofas that tesselate to create different forms within a space and a modular seating system that encourages interaction between people.

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Product news: these triangular sofas by Dutch architects UNStudio were inspired by geological formations.

Created for furniture manufacturers Walter Knoll, the seats tesselate to form clusters that break up communal spaces like lobbies and lounges.

They are made of Polyurethane foam on a steel frame and can be upholstered in a variety of colour combinations that are meant to reference a collection of precious stones.

"The Seating Stones are designed to generate numerous different atmospheres, which is why we included a wide variety of possible configurations and colours but also a selection of materials," co-founder of UNStudio Ben van Berkel told Dezeen. "We also created something that wasn’t instantly recognisable as a chair and that in fact was somewhat more sculptural as a form."

UNStudio are launching the sofa design this week at Orgatec in Cologne, which continues until 27 October.

You can read more stories about UNStudio here»
See all our stories about seating»

Here's some more information from the designers:

Seating stones

Throughout history natural formations have been used to provide seating elements for rest, relaxation, gathering and communication. Inspired by the rhythmic smoothness of geological formations, the sculptural Seating Stones exhibit a playful take on spatial awareness and versatility, presenting myriad possibilities for placement, color, texture, arrangement and communication.

Seating Stones are designed as individual objects and can be used autonomously. However they can also be placed side by side as a family of forms in a variety of configurations. The shape and contours of the seating elements facilitate a wide range of possible groupings. They can be placed together, either to accommodate privacy or to invite communication; they can be both individual and private or social and open.

Seating Stones are equally versatile when it comes to multipurpose usage, offering a diversity of options for placement; from offices, waiting rooms, lobbies and meeting spaces to use in the home. In all situations the configuration of the seating elements can be arranged to suit individual spaces and the desired ‘connectivity’ of the users.

Inspired by the bright and varied natural fabrics produced by the Incas of Latin America, Seating Stones can be upholstered in a wide variety of fabrics and colours. Furthermore, the fabric types and colours can be mixed, creating different appearances and textures in each element, or in a grouping of individual seats. The fabrics of the Seating stones can therefore reference a simple, individual stone, or alternatively can resemble a mixed formation of richly coloured minerals.

Seating Stones, Walter Knoll, Herrenberg, Germany, 2012
Client: Walter Knoll
Location: Herrenberg, Germany
Size/s: w x l x h: 1596 x 876 x 800
Materials: steel frame and PU Foam, upholstered.
Seat Comfort by belts
Status: will be presented at Orgatec 2012

Credits

UNStudio: Ben van Berkel, Caroline Bos with Martijn Prins, Maurits Fennis and William de Boer
Walter Knoll: Markus Benz and Jurgen Rohm

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by UNStudio appeared first on Dezeen.