Now in its second year, to celebrate the launch of theGreat Heal’s Bodging Raceall this week we’re catching up with the competitors.
Today it’s the turn of the bodging project founder Chris Eckersley, a multi-disciplined artist and designer whose ethos of ‘quiet design’ places emphasis on ‘good proportions’ to create furniture with longevity. To talk more about the contest and his approach to craft we caught up with the man himself at his studio in ‘deepest Herefordshire’.
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What made you want to become a designer and maker?
From a young age I was always drawing and making things. I grew up in Birmingham, which in those days was a place teeming with small factories or back-street workshops, so a huge variety of making was going on all around me.
I’ve maybe inherited something from my grandfather and great-grandfather, who were both surveyors, as I’m interested in plans, measurements, relative sizes and the placement of things.
Later on I went to art school and studied sculpture, which seemed the obvious thing to do.
Why is it important to maintain the craft of bodging?
Keeping old crafts alive just for the sake of it is something that’s not very important to me.
‘Bodging Milano’ first started as hands-on research into back-to-basics chair-making – with the results taken to the Milan Furniture Fair thanks to Rory Dodd – but then the project quickly developed into a way of thinking about design through direct making.
So it’s thinking-through-making we’re promoting – people don’t always realise this.
What role does the craft of a piece play in your design process?
Designers are always interested in how their designs will be made or crafted, and so this often leads to an interest in collaborating with makers. Sadly, this doesn’t always work the other way around.
How do you think your designs differ to those of the other bodger’s?
We’re all individuals with different aims and intentions. I’m keen to design useful pieces suitable for production, but I’m not alone in this. On the other hand I very much like what Carl’s doing with his slightly anarchical one-off objects.
What impact do you think the time limitations of the Great Heal’s Bodging Race the will have on your design?
The time limitation is wonderful as it forces you to think and act as quickly as you can, and so these events become sort of brain-storming sessions. Having the other bodger’s and also the friends around for comments, mickey-taking, and lively debate is another positive aspect.
Do you have any ideas of what you plan to make for the event?
Only vague plans at the moment as my thoughts have centred on what we are not making. For this event for the first time we will move away from making chairs and I think that now we have Gitta back with us we’ll be reaffirming her rallying cry of ‘No Wavy Gravy’!
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Don’t miss Chris and the gang making furniture live in our Tottenham Court Road store window all this week and make sure to check out his and fellow bodger Sarah Kay’s new Stipo range of furniture designed exclusively for Heal’s.
