Furniture Made Using Wind by Merel Karhof

Designer Merel Karhof’s collection of upholstered furniture pieces, called Windworks, is made using materials produced using wind power, an inexhaustible, and free, energy source.

Watch the video for a little insight into the production process:

In 2010, she set up the ‘Wind Knitting Factory’, which is a completely wind-powered knitting machine where when it’s windy, the machine knits quickly and when it’s calm, it knits more slowly. While generally the machine knits things like scarves, Karhof decided to go bigger and upholster furniture.

Karhof began the collaboration between three millers, that included a saw miller, a color miller, and a knitting miller (herself), in the northern part of Holland where windmills are common. Each of the well-preserved windmills in the area produces a different type of raw material.

The wood gets cut and assembled at the sawmill and then transported by the river to the pigment mill. The yarn is dyed with natural dyes and then it moves on to be knitted into the material for the collection you see here. Each colored pillow section denotes the amount of time needed by the wind to make it.