The way design in the West references the Middle and Far East is often influenced more by economic and less by creative transfer.The furniture company e15 has shown that there is another way, having won the Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany 2008 for its sofa system SF03 Shiraz, which represents a successful synthesis of the Oriental culture of seating and communication, and the minimalist formal language of the Occident.
What is special about it is that the readily assembled backrest (85 or 125 cm high) lends the seating an air of protected comfort and at the same time serves as a textile space partition. As the seating elements can be arranged in any number of ways, you can create an island of comfort as a room within a room. e15 received a further award for its largest interior design project to date. The studio devised the interior design of the public areas of the 8000-square-meter building for the Xue Xue Institute, the first private university for creative disciplines in Taipeh (Taiwan), and furnished it with the company's renowned solid wood furniture. In the Kitchen Lab there are large made-to-measure versions of the oak table "Bigfoot," each sitting 22 students, "Calle" benches in the shop and other furniture also appears to perfectly reflect the contemporary Taiwanese architecture and the Asian lifestyle. e15 was awarded the "Design for Asia Award" by the Hong Kong Design Center for its services to design. As one of the very few design studios in Germany which designs and also manufacturers its products itself, these two further awards are also a fitting acknowledgement of the entrepreneurial achievement of the team around co-founder Philipp Mainzer. www.e15.com
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