SCI-FI DESIGN 093


which was designed for the chemical company Bayer and exhibited at the Visiona 2 exhibition in Cologne, Germany, in 1970 is a prime example of his futuristic vision for interior design. Presented onboard a pleasure boat, the cave-like installation, characterised by its vibrant colours, organic forms and synthetic textiles, is regarded as the climax of Panton’s creative vision. With luscious shades of violet and blue, and a glowing centre of red, yellow and orange, its fl oors,


walls and ceilings fl owed together without any clear transitions, creating an experience of colours and surfaces that surprised and wowed visitors.


Iconic furniture designs have appeared in numerous science fi ction fi lms. Henrik T or- Larsen’s classic Ovalia Egg Chair from 1968 was used by Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in Barry Sonnenfeld’s Men in Black (1997), while Marc Newson’s Orgone Chair (1993) can be spotted in Ridley Scott’s 2012 fi lm


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9 Marc Newson, Orgone Chair, 1993


© Vitra Design Museum Photo: Jürgen Hans


10 Verner Panton, Fantasy Landscape at the exhibition Visiona 2, Cologne, Germany, 1970


© Verner Panton Design AG, Basel


11 Louis Durot, Aspirale, approx. 1970


© Vitra Design Museum Photo: Andreas Sütterlin


12 Lloyd Schwan, Statuette, 1995


© Vitra Design Museum Photo: Jürgen Hans


13 Patrick Jouin, Solid C2, 2004


© Vitra Design Museum Photo: Jürgen Hans


14 Konstantin Grcic, Chair One, 2008 © Vitra Design Museum Photo: Andreas Sütterlin


15 Joris Laarman, Aluminum Gradient Chair, 2013


© Vitra Design Museum Photo: Jürgen Hans


16 ZYVA Studio & Charlotte Taylor,


Neo-Chemosphere, 2021 © Zyva Studio X Charlotte Taylor


Prometheus. Set in the late 21st century, the fi lm follows the crew of the spaceship Prometheus as they seek out the origins of humanity on a distant world. Newson’s chair, which leans heavily on the space age aesthetic, emerged from his experiments with new production methods and processes, specifically his desire to find a way of working with aluminium in fluid form. Scott’s celebrated 1982 fi lm Bladerunner imagines a dystopian future Los Angeles where a fugitive group of synthetic humans, known as ‘replicants’ are being hunted down by burnt out cop Rick Deckard. Its moody, neo-noir aesthetic pulls from the past as much as the future. Deckard’s Frank Lloyd Wright-modelled apartment, for example, is lit by various 1950s lamps, including a vintage Lightolier desk lamp by Gerald T urston and a Dazor Saucer Lamp. T e fi lm even features Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Argyle Chair (1897), which despite being nearly 130 years old still has a futuristic feel with its attenuated lines and unusually high back topped with an enlarged oval headrest.


From the 1990s, computer-aided design, digitisation and 3D printing provided the impetus for a new wave of futuristic developments and at the Schaudepot are many examples of how the search for material innovations have inspired today’s designers. Patrick Jouin’s Solid C2 (2004) was the fi rst furniture piece made using laser sintering, a type of 3D printing process that uses high- powered lasers to sinter, or bind, fi nely powdered material into a solid structure. Formed from intersecting ribbons of criss- crossing material, the Solid C2 chair ignores furniture-making traditions in favour of the freeform shapes that 3D printing allows. Also on display is Joris Laarman’s Aluminium Gradient Chair (2014), the fi rst chair to be printed in metal, and Jólan van der Wiel’s otherworldly Gravity Stool (2011), created


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