The most important basis for a pleasant and stylish living and working atmosphere is a certain basic order - objects must be stowed and sorted. However, the requirements are - depending on the area of life - very diverse: workspaces and offices rely on filing cabinets that are flexible to use and also robust and secure. Modular design furniture, such as the Stapelbox M1 from Vario or the customisable USM Haller modular furniture system are particularly suited to these requirements. In domestic spaces, apart from functionality the individuality also stands to the fore, for all the choice in terms of colours, materials and finishes. Also suitable for domestic purpose are customisable shelving systems that are versatile and can be employed as shelving, bookshelves and/or filing cabinet
TV Lowboard R 109 N from Müller Möbelfabrikation
Vitra's Hang it All Clothes Rack
Modular storage from USM Haller
String Shelving System
...Similarly, at each and every design week or furniture fair we invariably ask ourselves if we need ever more sectional/modular shelving and storage systems, as we stand in front of another interpretation of the concept... In terms of shelving and storage we're much harder than we are with chairs, and often decide that we don't...
It's more or less a century since the first steel tube furniture was developed, and looking around you it's relatively easy to believe that since then everything has been done, that steel tube furniture has reached its full potential. Or perhaps more...
...Or, for example, the ninth and tenth of the eight cabinets: two vitrines in the permanent exhibition space specially curated in context of Organizing Things to allow for reflections on Office Arrangement, via, for example, folders of varying genres, rubber stamps or index cards, that unassuming tool that was of such fundamental importance to the development of commerce in the early 20th century; and to allow for reflections on Systems Design, via, for example, the Braun Lectron modular electronic experimentation kit, Wilhelm Wagenfeld's Kubus storage system, or index cards, that unassuming tool that was of such fundamental importance to the development of museal and archive collections... Going forward our physical, tangible instruments and tools will without question change, or perhaps better put, going forward ever new physical, tangible, digital, instruments and tools will emerge and become dominant, an inevitably underscored not only by Serverraum, but by, and amongst many other examples to be found in the Museum der Dinge, the iPod, the index cards, Wilhelm Wagenfeld's Kubus storage system, or by the two photographic slide storage cabinets in the temporary exhibition space, which all confirm that over time our accustomed physical, tangible instruments and tools for organizing become obsolete, become replaced by, to partially misquote a Konstantin Grcic, New Normals...
...As with most furniture genres, save arguably the bed, shelves are an essentially human invention, one universal amongst the numerous peoples of the earth, and one whose (hi)story can be traced back to the earliest peoples; for example, in the remains of the neolithic settlement at Skara Brae on Orkney one finds evidence of shelving units, both stacked systems and wall recesses, and, one presumes, that those early shelves were conceived as places of storage and display... In the intervening 5000 years since the Skara Brae community established itself, the purpose and functionality of shelving has barely changed; however, and as with all those objects with which we share our lives, the cultural relevance of the shelf has taken on all manner of metaphorical, idiomatic and figurative uses, meaning that shelving has long since ceased to be a purely physical place of storage and display...
...And not just physically as storage spaces, be that as a kitchen cupboard, office filing cabinet or domestic wardrobe, but also figuratively as keepers of the unknown... Promising a mix of cupboard/storage designs, both historic and contemporary, and by the likes of Le Corbusier, Maarten Baas, Willy Guhl or Enzo Mari, and art projects, including representations of cupboards in cinematic and literary contexts, Cupboard Love aims to explore not only the physical cupboard, past, present and future but also the social, cultural and metaphorical relevance and importance of the cupboard, and thereby seek to revaluate our relationship to our storage objects ...
