Jess Stubenbord

Wanderlust Chair

The Wanderlust chair is a piece of furniture meant to shift the way we look at home furnishing. A finalist in the Industrial Designers Society of America's esteemed IDEA Awards, the design collapses down to take up less than 1/5th of the original area, making transportation and storage easy as well as greatly reducing shipping costs. It is constructed using a Kevlar composite for the body and high grade aluminum for the joints and connections. The seat is made from comfortable, yet tough quilted leather that slides off for storage.

A locking articulated hinge which slides out of the frame to collapse in conjunction with a stationary pivoting hinge that rotates on one axis allow this design freedom uncommon in most contemporary folding chairs while shrinking to 1/5th the size.

An extremely light and durable composite material more forgiving than carbon fiber and far stronger than traditional fiberglass seemed the natural choice when looking to make furniture last a lifetime.

Where repetitive motion required higher friction wear resistance while keeping the weight light I looked at the incredibly durable 7075 Aluminum alloy. The articulated locking ball joints should outlast any stationary part on a traditional chair by decades.