Model: The Cow Chair

This is the first in a series of posts I will do where I make scale or full working prototypes of a few Ideas I've had for products or furniture. This one is the "Cow Chair", a light hearted idea for an upholstered club chair. Apologies for the terrible phone photography but it was the only camera I had available at the time.







To the left is the original quick sketch of the proposed design. The material to be used for the prototype is Cardboard as it is the only material I had in any abundance having just taken deliver of a bed and having a very small bin to dispose of the packaging.

I had some guidance and inspiration while I was making this prototype in the form of Charles and Ray Eames, even if they're just made from cardboard it was nice to have them looking over me while I worked.







The first part I made was the sides of the chair, these were cut using a serrated edged pen knife which made the cutting a bit easier with this thickness of the board.

I folded the board in two so I could cut both sides at the same time and ensure they were even.

 

Next I made the seat of the chair. To ensure the back of the chair would match up with the sides in height and depth I marked the piece to be turned into the seat from the edge of the sides.

These parts were then taped together to give the basic form.

 

The next part was to build up the seat and back of the chair with padding.

 A number of peices of card were taped together for this purpose with the join concealed under the fold of the back cushion.

The whole model was then taped with masking tape to allow the pattern of the fabric and decorative details to be drawn on. Here's the taped chair with the cushions in place.

Now to make the headrest. This part was quite difficult to work out. The irregular shape of the head and the fact card this thick does not particularly like to be folded resulted in an awful lot of grooves cut in the piece to facilitate the folding.

With the piece rolled into shape it was then taped to match the rest of the chair

Now with the addition of two horns the chair was almost complete

The chair fabric pattern and face details were now drawn on. In a production version I would imagine details like the eyes and eye lashes would be better suited to be raised plastic details rather than on the surface to compliment the cartoon nature of the chair.

Well there she is... And doesnt she look happy! I also have drawings made for a sheep variant chair which Would be similar though possibly upholstered differently.

Stay tuned for more...

John O'Shea 2012