desalto's softer than steel furniture collection by nendo delicately folds like paper

desalto’s softer than steel furniture collection by nendo delicately folds like paper
all images courtesy desalto

like the delicate malleability in paper, the ‘softer than steel’ furniture collection designed by nendo for italian manufacturer desalto includes three benches, a chair, a family of small tables, a coat rack and a family of wall shelves. ‘we bent a tabletop’s edges to attach onto the frame like cloth draping over the frame’s edges, so that the tabletop can be picked up like a tray,’ explains nendo. ‘by adding flipped, bent and wrapped details to metal sheets and rods, the ordinarily hard material gains new functionality and a light, flexible feel, as though the metal has become paper or cloth.’ details of the construction, such as for the bench, flips sections of the surface up, giving the seating object a naturally extruding backrest. other elements within the series includes a coat stand, where poles wrap around each other to create the structure.

the chair’s tubular backrest bends across the rear to the front

a section of the bench has been flipped up and turned into the backrest

 detail of the fold

the collection of tables have been designed with voids, allowing them to overlap without intrusion

detail of the tables overlapping 

wall shelves resemble slightly rolled sheets of paper