Marklund Atelier

Fald began as an argument about upholstery. Most soft lounge chairs are heavy objects that appear heavy; the ambition here was a chair that feels enveloping to sit in and almost weightless to look at, and the only way to have both is to separate the soft part from the structure completely.

The shell is a single moulded form — seat, back and arms in one continuous surface with no seam above the underside. It is upholstered in one piece over a cold-cure foam of two densities, firmer under the sit-bones and progressively softer toward the arm, so the chair supports where support is wanted and yields everywhere else. There are no buttons, no piping and no top-stitching. The only line on the chair is where the fabric wraps under.

Under it sits a frame of 12 mm solid steel rod, bent in two planes and finished in a dark bronzed lacquer. It touches the shell at four points and holds it 210 mm off the floor, which is low enough to read as a lounge chair and high enough that the floor stays visible beneath it. Seen from across a room, the chair appears to be resting on a drawn line.

The covers are removable. Every seam is accessible, the shell can be re-covered in an afternoon by the maker's own workshop, and the frame outlives any textile put on it — which is the only sustainability claim this project makes and the only one we can back.

Fald is offered in boucle, in a heavy undyed linen and in a full-grain vegetable-tanned leather that arrives pale and darkens over about two years.

Fald Lounge Chair