The Lap of Luxury
Patrick Norguet’s Orly armchair for Bernhardt melds Parisian style
with American comfort.
By Paul Makovsky
May 2004
For the past few years Bernhardt Design, a 113-year-old family-owned
firm based in Lenoir, North Carolina, has been making waves in the
design world by creating simple, durable, and timeless pieces with the
collaboration of designers such as Fabien Baron, Mark Goetz, and Lauren
Rottet.
This year the company will be launching works by designers including
Tyler Brûlé, Ross Lovegrove, Bang Design, Jeffrey Bernett,
Christian Biecher, Jhane Barnes, and Patrick Norguet. Metropolis
tracked down Norguet and asked him to talk about the design of his Orly
armchair (shown here) and sofa for Bernhardt
(www.bernhardt.com), which
makes its debut at this year’s International Contemporary Furniture
Fair (ICFF), in New York.
**
There weren’t really any production difficulties in making the
prototype and chair, mainly because from the start I designed it to be
simple to produce and inexpensive to make. This was done precisely to
avoid any problems in manufacturing.
I wanted to bring in a “plugged-in” aspect to make it as basic
and elegant as possible. The cushion is “plugged in” to the
backrest, which can be taken off and recovered in a different
fabric.
I decided to take the archetype of a sofa or armchair and design it as
simply and as purely as possible. I wanted to go back to the basics of
what the experience of sitting is all about. It was a process of making
it less complicated.
The chair isn’t very deep since it’s for the contract market
and is meant to be used in an office lobby or waiting room rather than
for residential use, which often requires a deeper seat.
The chair can be covered in any Bernhardt textile, in any combination of
colors.
It’s called Orly, after the Paris airport, because it symbolizes
travel and has an international feeling to it. |
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Dimensions:
W = 36.5 in.
D = 33.75 in.
H = 27.5 in. |
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Patrick Norguet (b. 1969) was born and raised in Tours, France,
and graduated in 1995 with a degree in industrial design from the Ecole
Supérieure de Design, in Paris. He has worked in many fields,
from furniture and product design to exhibitions and interiors. From
1987 to 1990 Norguet was in charge of the window display and special
events at Louis Vuitton. Since then his relationship with the world of
fashion and luxury goods has grown stronger and led to numerous projects
with brands such as Dior, Lanvin, Guerlain, and Bally. He recently
completed designing the interiors for the Renault car showroom in Paris
and is currently creating sofas and armchairs for Artifort, storage
units for Liv’it, and the interiors for the main showroom in Paris
for Lancel.
Top, courtesy LaForce + Stevens; bottom, courtesy Patrick Norguet |
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