Cheap Ass Elites

for Dover Street

2nd Edition

 

Industrial Basket for an even snobbier ass.

 

Thai designer Saran Yen Panya‘s ‘Cheap Ass Elites’ is a chair installation which criticizes what is socially considered ‘high’ and ‘low’ in regards to design.

 

Designer’s own words: ‘Combining mass-produced household objects and plastic elements the installation sarcastically illustrates and questions what society’s indoctrination is really built on. This project is a critique on the gap between the rich and the poor, good taste and bad taste and social hierarchy in modern society.

 

“Designing Desire — The Fact is that it is very difficult to argue that there is any real purpose in the design of a chair, which a briefing has laid down should be like any other chair, but different from it.” an excerpt taken from the book DESIRE : Shape of things to come : Gestalten

 

Cheap Ass Elites 2nd edition is actually the official start of 56thStudio. We discovered that creating an object is not only about playing with forms and functions but also stimulating desire. And that was when we discovered new approach to the so called “Product Design”.

We once assumed that furniture design is for those who create Lazy boy sofa or beautiful Danish Furniture. But in fact, there is a world where communicative objects are desirable, and desirable objects are marketable. It would seem like there are more approach to “Product design” than “form follow function” or vice-versa?

 

The second edition of “Cheap Ass Elites,” we focused more on trying to improve the function of the chairs as well as keeping it sculptural and decorative. Of course, for those who unreasonably want it.