Simon Pengelly with Theo Chair
Ten years ago, when acclaimed British furniture designer Simon Pengelly, was asked to design a wooden stacking chair for use in churches, neither he or Chorus Furniture (commissioning the design) would have predicted where the result would lead them. In its role as a church chair, Theo has won numerous awards and sits proudly in ecclesiastical buildings across the globe. It is the highly resolved nature of its design that has seen the chair transcend from churches into a multitude of environments in which it is effortlessly suitable. The growth in popularity of the chair across a range of applications naturally led to the development of a matching family of Theo products.
A decade later and Chorus, which is part of New Design Group, has just completed a successful show at the Stockholm Furniture Fair exhibiting the Theo family in a stand-alone display. Stockholm also saw the launch of a further two products into the range: the Theo Worktable and Theo Media Screen.
In a recent interview, Simon Pengelly was asked what which of his designs he was most proud of: “There are many that I’m proud of for lots of reasons, but the Theo Chair and the extended Theo range, designed and developed for Chorus, is certainly one of my favourites. The project was (and still is) a joy to do because of the collaboration with the client and supplying manufacturer. Furthermore, the purity of the concept allows us to keep adding to the range in an intuitive way, enabling Theo to be offered into an enormous number of very differing environments. Theo was a project where every facet of the process just clicked, and these projects are very rare.”
To celebrate ten years of Theo, New Design Group are dedicating their entire Clerkenwell showroom to showing the range. The show, dubbed ‘Theo Takeover’ is open to visitors from 21 May until 21 June at 250-252 Goswell Road, London.
