Getting a child to sit up straight can be quite a task, but the designers at Think & Shift take this impossible behavior and use it to inspire the idea, looks and working of the Hideaway Chair.
Created for kiwi company New Shoots, to be used in their child care centers across New Zealand, the Hideaway Chair offers a space for children to get away from the noise, bustle and distractions of their everyday environment.
Offering a comfortable and private space for individual or shared use, the modern chair design creates a micro-context within the busy daycare centers.
The architects take a novel approach to the design; ignoring traditional anthropometric tenets, they break away from merely scaling down adult chairs to really arriving at a product suited to the mindset, use and imagination of a child.
Built as a low lying, encompassing spherical shell, this modern chair design offers audio and visual privacy, articulated as a series of four semicircular molded plywood sections. These sections can be pulled apart for easy transport and storage, while the sustainably processed hardwood ensures the chair meets the high usage and functional demands of this environment.
The upholstery too can be removed for cleaning, aided by the gap between each section that lets most of the rubbish slip through.