People often ask why I like upcycle design so much. Well one of the reasons is that it shows us just how many things, often everyday objects, are thrown away. People do this without asking themselves if there isn’t another way. And visitors of upcycleDZINE know the answer, yes upcycling.
A great example is timber. A natural material we often take for granted and discarded in huge amounts. I know that it’s an easy material to recycle, but like the letters ‘re-‘ already give away, it’s downgraded, it has less value. And that’s where upcycling comes in, by upgrading the material giving it more value and a second life.

Timber furniture gives the experience of a lumberjack

Walking into a furniture store you’ll find an abundance of beautiful furniture completely or partially made out of wood. Most of the brands can not or will not tell you where their wood originally comes from. In many cases it’s wood from special plantations and beautiful rainforests.

It would be great though if these brands started to think about possibilities of using discarded wood. Just like work by an enormously creative studio I stumbled upon some time ago. The studio is called Triple Eyelid and was founded by Jackie Tan in 2014 and now comprises a team of local dedicated young designers and is based in Singapore. One of their main goals is research and development of environmentally sustainable upcycle design.

A product that immediately caught my attention was a piece of minimalist furniture design. I’m talking about the Lumberjack Stool, displaying rawness and simplicity. Every outward facing side of the stool is carefully chosen to showcase the most beautiful and natural wood grain pattern. The timbers are arranged in a different layout to produce a subtle yet interesting pattern on the seating end.

Triple Eyelid:

“When being carried around, the stool emulates a pile of freshly chopped timber tied together with straps. Everyone can experience being a lumberjack for a moment.”

The Lumberjack Stool can be used as a high or low stool, by laying it flat. Fun and functional aspect is that it has a steel handle, so it can easily be carried around. The stool is made out of reclaimed timber from architectural sites in Singapore and uses nylon straps with galvanised steel buckles and of course the steel handle. Dimensions are 200 X 200 X 450 [W x L X H in mm].
The website of Triple Eyelid states: “Every piece of timber is carefully measured to achieve the overall dimension of the stool. Before the timber can be used, they are checked repeatedly for the presence of rusty nails. After ensuring all nails have been removed, the timber are hand sanded using 400, 800 and 1200 grade sandpaper to sure no wood splinter can hurt the end user.”

Photos © Triple Eyelid

Being a creative studio they want to focus on re-define, re-design, and most importantly, reducing environmental waste. As designers from commercial, residential and hospitality background, they witness massive amounts of waste materials discarded from job sites daily which they find especially wasteful.
Very glad they do, because otherwise they wouldn’t have those great resources for creating their amazing upcycle design products.

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