Back in April we asked Pascal Berberat, Head of the Vitra Airport Division why airport seating always has armrests. And thus denies us all the chance to lie down and snooze.
A flippant question we concede, but such issues of course take on a very real significance when your flight is delayed and you find yourself with an unexpected overnight stay in the airport.
What ya gonna do?
Currently airports have either nothing to offer, meaning passengers have to find a way to make themselves comfortable on the airport floor. Or they have canvas, army style, camping beds which are often only slightly more comfortable than lying on the floor.
For her diploma project at the Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weisensee Chien-Hui Ko developed "Resmo" an absolutely ingenious folding emergency bedding system made from felt and specifically designed for all forced to camp out at an airport.
Usable either as a seat or flat as a bed, what really caught our imagination was the flap that allows the users a little bit of privacy in an otherwise public environment.
A truly wonderful example of paying attention to the function of the piece in the context of where it is intended to be used.
In addition Resmo folds, pretty, flat and so there should no storage problems - at least not an airport which one would hope has contingency plans in case of passengers suffering long delays - is light, can be easily transported and being made from felt also has an acoustic effect meaning that it helps reduce background noise and so improves the ambiance for all. A not inconsequential consideration given the potentially high number of irritated passengers: Anything that soothes the atmosphere has to be positive.
Naturally we don't see the use of such a system as being automatically limited to airports; Resmo can obviously also be employed in case of floods, fires or other mass evacuations.
And theoretically you could even keep a couple in the office for power-naps, relaxing after a long tele-conference etc, etc, etc...
All in all one of the best diploma projects we've seen so far this year.
