Drawing, Preparatory Drawing for Osso Chair

Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec’s design for the Osso chair was conceived with its manufacturer in mind. Mattiazzi, a family owned and operated company based in Udine, Italy, is known for its sophisticated use of cutting edge technology and its commitment to local manufacturing. Using an eight-axis CNC milling machine, Mattiazzi produces wooden furniture in complex shapes that were once reserved for injection-molded plastic. Mattiazzi uses wood carefully selected and sourced from the surrounding region. Environmentally conscious, their manufacturing equipment is powered by solar energy.

Osso, the Italian word for bone, alludes to the Bouroullec brothers’ desire to create a family of furniture whose material is what gives the structure strength but also to the physical inspiration for its form. The “assembling system of wooden panels allows a quite singular strength while preserving a design balance of the objects.” As the Bouroullecs have noted, “the quality of the wood literally makes the object.” The Osso chair design highlights the “sensuality” of the wood. The wood’s smooth, polished surface, which is not chemically treated, invites touch and allows the material, be it oak, maple or ash, to “express itself.”

This drawing, which was executed in the early months of 2011 by the Bouroullecs, was done after the Osso chair had already gone into development with Mattiazzi. Inspired by the successful form and production, the designers took the opportunity for a “moment of reflection” to consider how the Osso design might grow into a larger collection of furniture. The drawing illustrates the Osso chair in both child and adult size, as an armchair, and finally as a stool. The use of a purple felt pen brush to execute the designs on the sheet was a conscious one, though not evocative of a particular produced wood or stain. The brothers have written, “Felt pen allows [the] drawing of shapes not by contours but through masses of colour.” As “opposed to thin lines that can be used to define forms by structure and perimeter...the ink spreads on the paper in a generous, bold and massive way, producing shapes [through] concentric lines, stain by stain.”

Drawing, Preparatory Drawing for Osso Chair; Designed by Erwan Bouroullec (French, born 1976), Ronan Bouroullec (French, b. 1971); France; purple marking pen, graphite on white paper; 17.8 x 25 cm (7 in. x 9 13/16 in.); Gift of Erwan and Ronan Bouroullec; 2014-18-1