As a starting material for the chair, Feichtner used the wire which is usually used to weld fences. He made use of the technique of selective welding of two crossed wires, which is usually only applied in the production of fences. The Octagon Chair represents the form of the number eight, which results due to twelve looping wires that overlap only in the seating area. It is a cantilever, not made of a steel tube, but bent from twelve thin wires.
The project is a joint experiment: for the manufacturer, who usually does not produce furniture, and for the designer, who had no experiences with the material “wire fence”. An experiment that represents a starting point for a new approach and a mutual exchange. The result of the common passion for design.
The Octagon Chair was presented as part of the exhibition “Showcase 2018” at the designforum Steiermark.
In the course of an installation, the auction house Dorotheum showed the masterpiece “Sphere” designed by Thomas Feichtner. The bench made of computer generated splines just consists of fine stainless steel wires that were welded into a complex structure. Only due to digital production methods and state-of-the-art welding technology provided by H & S Zauntechnik, it was actually possible to implement this spherical surface. Based on a hexagonal basic structure, the asymmetric bench rests on three unequal legs and still distributes the load evenly into fine wires. A game of foreground and background.
Thomas Feichtner was born in Vitória, Brazil, but spent his childhood in Austria and Germany. He studied Industrial Design at the University of Art and Design in Linz in the early 1990s. In his first years as a designer, Feichtner initially designed capital goods and numerous products for the Austrian industry and was honored with international design awards, such as the Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany, the European Design Award, the Good Design Award (USA), the Josef Binder Award and the Design Prize Switzerland. In addition to his work as a product designer for Head, Tyrolia, Fischer and Blizzard, he also worked in the field of visual communication, such as for Swarovski, Adidas or the British-Israeli designer Ron Arad.
Today, Thomas Feichtner is one of the renowned Austrian designers. He designs products for traditional crafts businesses such as J & L Lobmeyr, Neue Wiener Werkstaetten, Jarosinski & Vaugoin, Augarten Porzellanmanufaktur, TON and Carl Mertens and implements free projects in cooperation with Vitra, Absolut, Thonet and FSB. His works have been shown at international exhibitions at the Triennale di Milano, the International Biennial of Design in Saint-Étienne, the Austrian Cultural Forum in London and the MAK, Museum of Applied Arts, in Vienna. They also have been incorporated into various design collections.
Together with his wife Simone, Thomas Feichtner lives and works in Vienna.
