“Beginning with the material form and beauty of the wood that is unveiled by milling a tree, the stories that tree has witnessed in it’s life are drawn out in our furniture with intelligent design and exacting craftsmanship..”
Two NSCAD University in Halifax alums, sculptor Mike Sharpe and third-generation woodworker Dennis Hale teamed up together in February 2013 to create intelligent furniture design guided by a “tree to table” approach.
The duo of Toronto-based Storyboard Furniture has recently designed the Plane Cloud, a decorative pendant light shaped by a geometric play of 12 identical curls of steam-bent wood – reminiscent of the shaving curls off a well tuned plane. Similar to their previous projects, the pendant lamp is created from strips of steam bent wood salvaged from Toronto’s urban forest. One side of the curl is finished with a Scandinavian traditional soap finish, while the other side is coloured with liquitex professional colour fast spray paint.
“We approach this work both as makers and artists. While we seek perfection in function and form when designing our furniture, we also look at this process through a different lens, one of storytelling and meaning making.”
The Plane Cloud has received a wide acclamation after its first launch in January 2015 at the Toronto Interior Design Show and continues to inspire.
Photography by Jasper Savage