d-i-y screen from More Furniture in 24 Hours
photo: marc raboy

One of the most inspiring D-I-Y books we know of is from the 70’s, with illustrations in black-and-white. It is Spiros Zakas’ More Furniture in 24 Hours, a book of plans for making simple, sculptural, practical pieces of furniture FAST, like this folding screen made of hollow-core doors and piano hinges. Unlike most hinged doors, this one doesn’t have to zig-zag to stand up…it can even be configured in a circle.

The book is chock full of ideas, which, if you don’t actually do them, will lodge in your mind as a possible solution or way to improvise your own creations, as a kind of liberation. Writes Zakas:

Making thing is an art, whether it is baking bread, sewing a quilt, or building a table. It is self-expression, a way of knowing what we like and how we like it, of discovering who we are. The interesting thing I have found is that everyone is creative in many ways if he or she will only try them. Just because you have neer done something doesn’t mean that you can’t.

folding screen plan from Furniture in 24 Hours
folding screen plan, photo: marc raboy

More Furniture in 24 Hours is available second-hand on Amazon, though many of the plans can be found online like this very cool chair, reminiscent of Carlo Bugatti’s folding chair:

chair from More Furniture in 24 Hours
photo: marc raboy

….

We’re going to check out Furniture in 24 Hours

via Ouno

Related posts: d-i-y stacked wood fireplace mantle
d-i-y: pallet chair (and stool and lamp…)
design hacker: d-i-y concrete block bedframe
stylish d-i-y fabric disguises for ugly furniture

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3 replies on “essential d-i-y book: ‘more furniture in 24 hours’

  1. this is actually a very common african chair design and extremely comfortable.

  2. @nina: really? in the 70s i built a chair somewhat in the same style (must have been a fad, somehow), slabs of wood fitted together, and it was somewhat uncomfortable. comfort must have something to do with the angle of the back piece. i was very proud of my chair, though, not least that it worked.

    i’m thrilled to see this kind of furniture get attention. it doesn’t take much to build big or small parts of the environment you live in.

  3. Yeah, iterations of that chair style can be found in all sorts of places, from Alexander Calder to African furniture makers. Calder’s chair was completely impossible to sit in, but looked really cool, and the big message was “He just did it, he went ahead and made it, anyway”.

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