Solar-Powered Furniture

What will they think of next? Well the next answer to that question — in a seemingly endless line of answers — is solar powered furniture. Yes the design, texture, and color of your next bench seat could all be calculated by none other than that great fiery ball in the sky.

Austrian design team mischer’traxler has come up with a solar powered contraption that creates a wide assortment of very unique furniture pieces. The makeup of each piece — one per day — is dictated solely by how much sunlight the machine receives throughout that day.

One Tree of an Idea

They call it “The Idea of a Tree,” and variations in weather, sunlight, time of year, and any pertinent environmental factor will create furniture of different shape, color, size. You might call it photosynthetic furniture. Stools, benches, containers, lamp shades; these are a few of the “Tree’s” solar powered creations to date.

The idea actually stems from the growth of a real tree. The designers were fascinated by the way a tree reacts to its surroundings, developing according to the various environmental changes that occur during its lifetime, recording every impact of change in its growth process. “Each single tree tells its own story of development.”

Katherina Mischer and Thomas Traxler combined that concept with their fascination with automated machines to come up with “The Idea of a Tree.” Their machine was recently put on display at the Berlin International Design Festival, even winning an award as one of the top three projects at the festival.

How It Works

“The Idea of a Tree” (tioat) works by drawing thread through tanks of dye and resin. It then wraps the threads around a mold spun by the solar powered machinery. Because that machinery is solar powered, the rate at which it works, and subsequently how the furniture is formed, depends on the solar intensity of any given day. For instance, on a cloudy day the thread will wrap more slowly, leading to results darker, thicker, and smaller than those created on a bright sunny day. One piece is created per day and “harvested” at nightfall.

Through this incredibly unique idea they’ve created a product that is directly connected to the environment in which it is produced. Naturally each completed piece bears a stamp revealing the date and place where it was made.

Via inhabitat

Posted on July 2nd in Solar Products by Dan.