Furniture and Interior Design | GDPD
C S Susanth
Outreach Programmes, NID
Keywords School furniture Ergonomic Coir composite board Sustainable design
The aim of my project was to create a variety of school furniture in coir board for selected age groups. Till date, very little intervention has been done with regard to design for juvenile, pre-school and school furniture. The scope for design intervention in this area includes the safety and comfort of the user, the manner in which the furniture is handled, effective and efficient use of materials and resources that cuts the cost of production at every level, because school furniture is usually manufactured in large quantities.
There is a strong correlation between improperly designed furniture and accidental death and injury to children. Therefore, the starting point for design was to primarily obtain the physical dimensions of children from various age groups, observe their postures and behaviours before carefully selecting structural dimensions and then target an ergonomically safe range of furniture. The process continued to classify them into sizes suitable to production, without compromising on comfort. A part of this process involved the fabrication of full-size mock-ups and prototypes, whereby function, aesthetics, and user comfort could be properly evaluated and design modifications made accordingly.
The use of a renewable resource such as coir in place of timber for the production of composite panels was a significant step towards sustainable design. It was a totally new experience for me, and helped increase awareness among children for a sustainable future.