AHEC lends a helping hand to next-generation designers

During this year’s Salone del Mobile, we were delighted to stage a celebration of emerging talent in the worlds of furniture and product design. For the exhibition – entitled ‘Class of 24’ and held at Triennale Milano – we called on a long-term collaborator, American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC), which felt like a natural step, given its unstoppable drive to experiment with timber, and its continuous support of diverse approaches to making by next-generation creatives.

AHEC collaborates on Wallpaper*s ‘Class of 24’ exhibition

As part of the exhibition, AHEC worked closely with two designers, Giles Tettey Nartey and Eleanor Hill, of Parti Studio, to create new bodies of work in American maple. Made in collaboration with London-based furniture maker Jan Hendzel, the pieces reflected both Nartey’s and Hill’s ongoing visual and cultural design research, while highlighting the qualities and potential of the chosen timber. ‘American hard maple is part of a wider narrative of underused species,’ says AHEC’s European director David Venables. One of his missions is to stress the importance of considering these timbers. ‘There is a myth that trees live forever, but [by not using the wood], you’re leaving some of your most valuable material in the forest to decay.’

The maple was transformed by Nartey and Hill into two radically different showstoppers. Nartey distilled his British-Ghanaian heritage into ‘Communion’, a large sculptural piece that formed part of his ongoing research into West African traditions. ‘African craft cultures are a catalyst for reimagining the spaces we live in,’ he says. This commission became an opportunity to explore culture, culinary tradition, and the rituals of domestic life in Ghana. His piece was conceived for the making of fufu – a West African dish formed by pounding cassava and plantain into a dough, a mundane act that becomes a communal performance, where everyone comes together in the shared experience of preparing food.

‘You have one person turning and kneading the mixture, and the other person standing up with the pestle, pounding it,’ says Nartey. ‘I had always seen this process as a choreography, so I wanted to reimagine that sort of everyday quotidian act as something like a performance.’ Characterised by a dark stain, the voluminous design features five workstations with mortars (woduro) and pestles (woma), sculpted by Hendzel using a technique that successfully conveys the vast spectrum of the maple’s grain. The design includes an outer table for food preparation, and an inner table with CNC-carved grooves, bowls and bumps for serving and dining. Seating around the table is inspired by traditional stools made by the Ashanti people of Ghana.

Meanwhile, Hill’s ‘Pirouette’ collection explored ‘the frillier sides of art and design history’, with nods to surrealism, trompe l’oeil and the Rococo period. Her series of colourful tables and stools was inspired by the fold and flow of fabric, pushing the boundaries of a three-axis CNC machine. The carefully considered geometric curves have been sculpted out of laminated boards of hard maple, refined using traditional woodworking methods. ‘We’re trying to take elements of surrealist imagery and turn that into physical reality by creating lightness and movement out of a typically very raw, hard, dense material,’ says Hill.

The resulting pieces appear almost frozen in a moment of joy, with the effect of movement carved through the layers of timber, revealing its rich grain. ‘Both [Nartey and Hill] have gone for the celebration of movement in their pieces,’ observes Venables, who gives due credit to Hendzel’s skill. ‘I think a lot of the outcome is thanks to his instinct as a maker, knowing the approach and what you think the wood will allow you to do. And actually learning as you go along, a hugely skilled thing to be able to do.’

americanhardwood.org
gilestetteynartey.com
parti.global
janhendzel.com