Tag Archives: ripple

LAYER’s Ripple Dining Table Uses a Wavy Plywood Core to Cut Weight

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Large dining tables are useful right up until you need to move one, when their reassuring weight becomes somebody else’s lifting problem. LAYER’s Ripple research table explores a lighter construction by giving thin plywood a corrugated profile instead of relying on a thick slab. That said, the project keeps a flat surface for everyday use while putting the waves underneath, mostly hidden from view.

The original table was specified at approximately 8.2 feet long and 39.4 inches wide, weighing about 19.8 pounds. That’s a generous dining surface for something intended to be moved by one person. Bringing it across a room for guests or shifting it away from the wall could become less of a coordinated household event. Its footprint, however, doesn’t shrink along with its weight.

Designer: LAYER

The material comes from a collaboration with Canadian manufacturer Corelam, using pressure lamination to form the repeating curves. LAYER specifies plywood approximately 0.12 inches thick, although that isn’t the overall depth of the assembled tabletop. The distinction matters here: the design gets its structure from a shaped sheet and layered construction, rather than pretending a thin, flat board can do everything alone.

Of course, a wavy dining surface would be a fairly annoying place to balance your coffee. Ripple covers its corrugated structure with a flat plywood sheet, leaving the waves visible below and along the edge. Plates and laptops get the ordinary surface they need, while the underside carries the more unusual geometry. The useful part doesn’t have to look particularly experimental from above.

The legs follow the same preference for shape over bulk. A refined version uses hollow triangular profiles, designed to increase rigidity in two directions. The tabletop’s underside also curves gently across its length and width. Those changes address a fairly obvious concern with lightweight furniture: being easy to pick up is only useful if the table still supports what you put on it.

The red finish keeps Ripple from disappearing into the background, even with such a thin outline. From the side, the top appears almost like a sheet balanced on four narrow supports. Along the short edges, the repeating curves reveal why that impression is misleading. The structure supplies its own ornament, without adding a carved border or a heavier decorative frame.

Using less wood is part of the environmental argument, too. The project’s original documentation claims 70% to 80% less material than a standard timber table, but doesn’t establish a defined comparison for that figure. Less material isn’t automatically a complete environmental assessment, either. Adhesives, finishing, production, and working life still matter, even when the basic idea of doing more with less is appealing.

LAYER presents Ripple as a studio research project, without a current retail price or ordering details. The construction offers an answer for people whose furniture has to move with them, though size remains a constraint. You might no longer need help with the lifting, but you’d still need a clear route through the house before taking that tabletop around a corner.

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Flat-packed pendant lamp creates ripples in your room ambiance

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We might take for granted the effect that lighting has in our lives, thinking they’re just there for illumination. Even that aspect, however, can have unintended consequences, such as when the light is too bright, too dim, too cold, or too warm. Suffice it to say that lighting fixtures can affect not only visibility but even ambiance, especially if the light source is always visible.

A pendant light hanging from the ceiling is one such example, and while it might sometimes be nerve-wracking to see them precariously swaying in the wind, they can also be a source of wonder, awe, and even calm. This particular design takes its inspiration from both nature and geometry to create an almost mesmerizing effect when viewing it from different angles.

Designer: Rikke Frost for BoConcept

Rippling water has always been associated with calm, meditation, and Zen. Unlike a gushing river, concentric circles expand at a gentle and uniform pace, creating a hypnotic movement that’s only broken when colliding with another rippling surface. You can’t make light ripple without some sort of liquid or substance, but this pendant light comes close to emulating that effect both in design and in lighting.

The Ripple lamp is composed of concentric hexagons loosely bound together with black fabric cords. When hanging from the ceiling, the pieces separate and drop to create a pyramid form that’s almost like a ziggurat. Because of this “three-dimensional” arrangement, you get a different and unique view when seen from different angles. Of course, from the top, it looks like a rippling pattern, one with hexagons instead of circles.

This composition also affects the light being distributed from the center. Light doesn’t just go down as with normal pendant lamps but also upward, which has the effect of diffusing the lamp’s glare. Naturally, it also casts interesting shadows which add to the mystical effect of the rippling form.

The lamp comes in a flat-pack form, with the eggshell white metal rings taking up less space when collapsed. Its design is simple and minimalist, yet effective in conveying a sense of calm and peace. Even with the light off, the Ripple lamp functions as a decorative piece that gives a unique visual to any room’s atmosphere.

The post Flat-packed pendant lamp creates ripples in your room ambiance first appeared on Yanko Design.