Colored-Pencil Table by Nendo

Japanese design studio Nendo created an installation for the 2013 Saint-Étienne Design Biennial featuring a series of pastel rainbow-colored, wooden tables. The project, entitled Colored-Pencil Table, explores the manipulation of surface texture in furniture design and a possible look at the future of it.

The table surfaces are developed with a technique called udukuri, where the top, soft layer of the cypress wood is carved away to expose the wood grain underneath. The wood then gets covered with paper and the wood grain is traced by shading over it with colored pencils. The grainy textures appear in color, as well as a raised relief from the tracing.

Nendo says:

This created a tantalizing juxtaposition between the familiar proportions of wooden and the finish of the paper, and an inviting fusion of the subtle shades and blur of the colored pencils with the raised wood grain.

Study

Photos by Hiroshi Iwasaki.

Caroline Williamson is Editor-in-Chief of Design Milk. She has a BFA in photography from SCAD and can usually be found searching for vintage wares, doing New York Times crossword puzzles in pen, or reworking playlists on Spotify.

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