How a rug inspired a bookcase
Kerf Cabinet
We designed and produced this highly unusual piece for our clients in Appledore, Kent in 2024.
Our brief was to design a bookcase for our clients’ garden office. Practically, they wanted an open bookcase with shelves or cubbies, lit by an integrated lighting system, and with provision below for storage behind doors. The overall size of the bookcase was dictated by the available space. But beyond these practical concerns, we sensed that the client wanted something visually interesting, if not provocative. Looking around their home with them, it was obvious they had a keen eye for design and for the original and innovative. In fact, nothing about how their home was furnished was in any way ordinary. We felt there was scope for a highly creative design.
Our initial concept was inspired by an intriguing rug in the garden office which took our eye, Un-Roll by Dutch designer, Clare Vos. We loved the wonderfully playful illusion of the rug unravelling, revealing the backing colour below and wanted to incorporate this idea of revealing process and confronting expectation into the design of the cabinetry.
kerf
We regularly use a plunge tracksaw to process panel materials for building furniture projects. This saw cuts directly into a sacrificial table top we have in the workshop specifically for the purpose. The ‘kerf’ cuts left behind on its surface trace the history of the various projects we’ve made in the workshop, producing an interesting, random aesthetic.
Our thought was to highlight this particular process by deliberately replicating these kerf cuts directly onto the surfaces of a pair of cabinet doors, producing an energetic, abstract relief pattern. The doors would then be spray finished in a soft powder blue colour, picked up from the rug. Our intention was that the contrast between the highly finished paintwork and the seemingly vandalised surfaces would produce an interesting and visually challenging piece of furniture. For the upper bookcase element, we thought to visualise these same intersecting kerf patterns, but in three dimensions, using the shelves and dividers to represent the kerfs. We drew up the concept and pitched it to our clients. They loved it.
Kerf Cabinet doors
We were good to go and got busy with the process of detailing the design for production and specifying materials. For the cabinet outer framing and back panels, we wanted to find a material which mirrored the beautiful engineered rustic oak floorboards used inside the office. We searched high and low for the right thing to harmonise with these one-of-a-kind boards. Exhausting the UK suppliers, we switched our focus to Europe and ordered samples from Belgium, France and Germany. Nothing was quite right. And then we had an epiphany. Instead of trying to match these uniquely designed floorboards, why not actually use them.
an unorthodox solution
Using engineered flooring to produce fine cabinetry seemed unorthodox to say the least but we worked out a way to achieve what we needed by constructing our own custom-made panels. We produced a mock-up and showed it to our clients. Again, they loved the idea. First, the floorboards were ‘laid’ onto a suitable substrate using a speciality flooring adhesive, then we used these panels to make the framing and back panels.
Our client wanted to be able to operate the integrated lighting via their iPhone. We used Nanoleaf LED strips which offer a programmable full colour spectrum and work with Apple Homekit. A lighting design was agreed with our clients and we made careful provision during the build to allow for the strips to run, hidden behind the verticals of the bookcase interior, and to bathe the cubby spaces in soft light.
The resulting bookcase is a compelling piece of furniture design, utterly unique and beautiful. I am extremely grateful to our clients for entrusting us with the creative freedom to design and fabricate this awesome piece of furniture.
The devil in the detail: The woodgrain was carefully matched to provide continuity between the upper and lower units.