Tabletop Terrain

[Image: By Daniel Dendra of anOtherArchitect].

To produce this new tea table, Berlin-based designer Daniel Dendra of anOtherArchitect explains that he used sound recordings taken from the streets of Cairo to generate CNC-milling patterns – thus creating one of the most complex joins I've ever seen in carpentry.

In Dendra's own words, he "recorded sound-snips from intersections in the city to generate a furniture piece."

[Image: By Daniel Dendra of anOtherArchitect].

The acoustically-inspired topography fills the underside of the table, which meets flush and perfectly with the base (where Dendra has carved the exact opposite surface). It is the silence, so to speak, for the other surface's noise.

[Images: By Daniel Dendra of anOtherArchitect].

Of course, if you get bored of drinking tea, or you simply don't like the table, you can just separate the top from its base – and you've got a readymade milled noise-map of Cairo.

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Blogger urban_drift said...

its a shame that the nicest part of this table is on the bottom - i guess you'd just see a plywood sheet from the top...

September 15, 2009 12:20 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

I do not know why they design the part so well that ppl do not notice.

September 15, 2009 3:26 PM  
Blogger Irina Bogdan said...

love the concept!

have a break, drink a tea, eat a KitKat, pause the daily rush for 5 minutes and enjoy your drink immersed in a sea of silence. turn down the urban noise. neutralize it! and step into your own universe for a while. chill down. cap the urban boombox. after you finish press play and pull the buds out of your ears. come back to the real world. put the table top down and slide right back into the game! :)

the cool thing is that as long as you keep the table top on top you have the luxury of prolonging your tea cup, rush break, relaxing time glimpse

September 15, 2009 9:32 PM  
Blogger Jack Self said...

"and you've got a readymade milled noise-map of Cairo."

Oh.

Rad.

Just what I always wanted.

September 16, 2009 12:03 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

this looks quite simiilar to the first year design exercise at UTS

September 16, 2009 6:56 PM  
Anonymous susanna said...

pholosophy is (maybe) interesting, but the table is... really orrible. where is design?

September 17, 2009 11:25 AM  
Blogger Rob said...

this is a perfect example of "you could, but why?"
1. we know CNC can do this, so it's really not that impressive in terms of fabrication
2. why cairo street sounds? is this some type of psuedo-"oriental" inspired furniture?
3. agree w/ the choice of material. it's not a very attractive finish.
4. i do like the metaphor of hidden complex joinery holding something together, but again it's CNC so this is diminshed.

September 17, 2009 12:47 PM  
Blogger mooodi said...

You'd get very similar 3d structures if you just picked a run down secition of asphalt off the streets of Cairo.

September 17, 2009 2:49 PM  
Anonymous Sean O'Hara said...

Maybe it would be better appreciated on a reflective floor or a glass floor.

September 19, 2009 6:54 PM  
Anonymous Stijgerart said...

I wonder how he got the sound into 3d files

March 23, 2012 11:05 AM  

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