ERCOL SAYS... SIT DOWN
We visited the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green today and thoroughly enjoyed the current exhibition, 'Sit Down: Seating for Kids', sponsored by Ercol. Designs by Charles and Ray Eames, Robin Day and Thomas Chippendale are amongst those featured. The main hall also plays host to the Ercol chair arch (pictured), commissioned by Wallpaper* magazine and previously exhibited at the V&A in South Kensington. Curators Catherine Bornet and Noreen Marshall have created a show that brings a potentially dull subject to life, helped greatly by playful illustrations by Emma Houlston and 3D design from Wells Mackereth . The show deserves extra praise for its efforts to engage children (and adults, of course) in the chair manufacturing process: 'The earliest of these seats (1680) look back to a tradition where designer and maker were the same craft worker. Even when individual furniture designers became fashionable and well known, like Thomas Chippendale (1718-1779), they usuall...
