"From Delicateness To Strength"

"Marcel Wanders.  Just as a snowflake is formed, one crystal deposited upon another, a crocheted doily grows through an accretive process - one knot built upon a previous knot until a perfectly symmetrical pattern takes shape.  From a single string - knotted, looped, and twisted repeatedly - the intricate order of the doily emerges, bringing comfort to pattern-seeking minds."           - Mara Holt Skov           

Lace Tables Prototype

How a man is able to transform something so ordinary in our everyday lives, like a doily you place at the dinner table, into something extraordinary, conceptual and unique is almost unfathomable. 

If I was given the challenge to turn a doily, which is so delicate, flimsy and ornate, into something differerent, I may have thought of a cushion cover or candle holder.  But I would not have thought of taking the elements of a doily and crochet technique and transform it into a table.  Why?  Because I would be afraid of it failing.

However, with Wanders, he is constantly keeping an open mind.  Rather than focusing on the results, he is always thinking of every possible way there is to "transform the familiar into something different and deeper."  And because of this allowance to keep his creativity flowing, he is able to design things that are not stuck in the past and already done before.  Instead, he is always coming up with new ideas and starting new trends.  

He first began with the "Lace Table".  He was to turn something soft, lace, into a familiar object, which in this case was a table. This Swiss lace had to be hardened with resin and shaped into a cube shape to transform a soft material into a structure that was supposed to be able to withstand weight. Though it only went as far as a prototype because the lace was too soft to be functional, the creativity of thinking outside the box was more valuable than the actual object developed. It opened their eyes to things that has never been thought about before: to change handmade textiles into something that could essentially be considered as a raw material, such as the new age wood or metal.

The "Lace Table" was a project Wanders constructed during his early years working for Droog.  It brought about more questions that they did not have answers to.  However, it enforced change as it lead to new directions.  It impacted the way people thought and made them realize that having an open mind may not lead to the desired result but it could light a match to a new flame.  With Wanders' ambition and drive, he was able to take the ideas he learned in the prototype stage and transformed it into something functional and usable, which will be discussed in the blog post "Sometimes Failure Leads To Success". 

Although this design may not have served its purpose as being a functional table, being a consumer, I'd buy it as decoration and it would be a beautiful, delicate and exquisite feature piece.