Irish designer David Irwin’s Tyneside lounger is his latest collaboration with British furniture company Deadgood. It is a stackable armchair made of solid oak timber, with removable cushions.
The lounger was initially made for Newcastle’s Tyneside Cinema but has been put into production by Deadgood. The chair’s design was made with the cinema venue in mind – it had to be compact, lightweight and stackable (as the seating is cleared away to make way for a gallery by day), and the neck pillow had to be detachable for cleaning.
The brief required working in timber, which Irwin has handled masterfully in beautifully crafted contemporary pieces for Habitat and previously for Deadgood. His industrial design studio, founded in 2011, specialises in furniture, product and lighting design with a streamlined aesthetic in a range of materials.
Here, Irwin’s approach of catering his design to the cinema’s broad demographic ultimately paid off to create a product that has solid commercial appeal. His aim, he says, was to create “an unobtrusive product that would fit within the surroundings of the gallery whilst retaining a warm and inviting ‘domestic’ character”.
Since everyone hates fighting over armrests at the cinema, Irwin gave each seat two generous armrests. A special joint between the arm and the back leg enables the chair to be stacked despite the arms’ generous width.
To ensure that the lounger could stand regular wear and tear and be comfortable for long periods, Irwin followed a rigorous prototyping process: sitting in them and watching films. The result is a chair whose every design conveys comfort and sturdiness.
