People / Oscar Warman
Oscar Warman is a British designer balancing design and build. Originally trained in Product design and alongside carpentry his work strikes a balance between craftsmanship and playfulness.
Shed Chair
By using only offcuts and parts with no other clear or perceived use, each part of the design only has certain possible uses, limiting the number of cuts and operations that can be done. For example the legs had rotten/frayed ends that needed to be cut in half and squared off, limiting their length, making them only appropriate as makeshift chair legs. This caused issues with the structure of the chair (it was rather wobbly) and so I cannibalised a shelf I had screwed on the wall and took its shelf brackets to support the back of the legs. Using very ornate shelf brackets as the chair’s rigid structure gives an interesting effect to the rest of the piece. By using the live edge wood for the front legs I was then stuck into finding something matching for the rear. The only part I could find long enough was a rectangular off-cut of birch plywood I found down the road from my house labelled, ‘free to take’ from a shop fit out.
By designing in this way I spent the time mocking up and offering each part to one another to try and resemble a chair shape. I like how few processes were used in the making of this piece and the time was spent problem solving how to make them function as a chair.
Extrusion Picture Frame
When I was making this piece I had no correct materials or blades to cut the lengths down to size. I bought 4 lengths of this extrusion type with the idea to mitre the corners and create a metal picture frame. So instead I decided to keep the extrusion at its standard 400mm length and create a frame that can be adjusted to the size of the internal picture but stays the same external size which creates a very interesting effect when hanging multiple different sized pictures next to one another.
I also used off the shelf standard fittings to create the frame creating this quite industrial effect similar to 3D printer and tool construction.
By being able to cut the extrusion I would have never discovered this piece as the initial intention was to generate a relatively standard styled picture frame. The other beauty of the extrusion is the internal slots that provide a perfect place for the backplate to slide into with no fixings.