Tuesday, 17 February 2009

Supplies

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Here's what I'll be knitting my chair with. The yarn is Sirdar Bigga, one of the bulkiest commercial yarn easily available, and I'll be knitting it on 15mm circular needles.

Thursday, 12 February 2009

The plastic chair

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This is the chair I'll be using. Surely you have a couple of these lying around in the garden or shed?

The plastic chair is apparently the world's most famous chair, according to this article, with millions sold all around the world. It has a blog dedicated to it, and a flickr pool here . Imagine if we could just cover one of these chairs in every country.

Wednesday, 11 February 2009

Would you like to knit a chair?

Knitted chair is not a new concept.
Some have knitted an actual structure and rigidify it, some have covered existing chairs with knitted fabrics. My project would fall in the latter category. This is my final project for a degree in BA Product Design. For the next two months I would be knitting around the structure of a very well known chair, the ubiquitous plastic chair. According to this article, this chair has become a canvas for many artists and designers, and I intend to do the same with my preferred medium, knitting. It is not my intention to knit another chair cozy, I am simply making use of a readily available structure.

Now, why would anyone want to knit a chair? I suppose I do share a bit of the yarnbombing philosophy, or knitters such as Alison Murray with her knitted house. This project is to exploit what knitters could do, to show the world that knitting is just as ubiquitous as the plastic chair, that it is something everyone could do. Furniture making is often not something you could do at home, but knitting is. Imagine knitting a chair in the comfort of your sofa!

With this project, I would like to make the most of the power of knitting. The plastic chair could be found in most corners of the world, and so does knitting. My hope is that knitters from around the world would join me in this project, for I could not do this alone. Could you just imagine the endless possibilities?
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Of course, I haven't actually knitted the chair, but I intend to do so very soon, and I will share with you my progress here. A pattern would be available here when I finished the task, but you are more than welcome to join me at any time. Please feel free to leave me a comment or ask questions here, or email me at yuvinia@gmail.com.