90's Office
Reimagining Function and Style Through Refurbishment
Project Description
During my one-month internship at Koncepteriet, I contributed to a project centered on refurbishing and upcycling old office furniture from the 1990s. Koncepteriet’s philosophy is deeply rooted in sustainability and circular design, and this project was an opportunity to reimagine outdated pieces while preserving their history. Inspired by the studio’s commitment to thoughtful reuse, I developed a design approach that both commemorates the past and revitalizes the furniture for contemporary use.
Concept
The core of my contribution was the idea to coat the old office furniture with a tinted lacquer. This solution was designed to serve a dual purpose: honoring the furniture’s past while giving it a fresh and modern aesthetic. The lacquer allows the wear and patina of the original materials—scratches, dents, and stains—to remain visible, transforming them from perceived imperfections into celebrated elements of character. At the same time, the tinted finish refreshes the overall look, elevating the furniture to a new status and making it relevant for today’s office environments.
This approach aligns perfectly with Koncepteriet’s passion for refurbishing and recycling, offering a way to extend the life of existing materials without erasing their stories. The tinted lacquer not only protects the furniture but also acts as a visual and conceptual bridge between its past and future, reinforcing the studio’s philosophy of sustainable innovation.
Pencil and Marker
(fig. 1)
Refurbishing with Purpose
In addition to the lacquer concept, I engaged in broader design and material research to explore solutions for modernizing the furniture. This included identifying sustainable materials such as cork and recycled wool felt for acoustic and functional improvements. I also evaluated ergonomic trends and user preferences, ensuring that the updated designs would meet contemporary standards while retaining the soul of the original pieces.
Throughout the project, I collaborated with the Koncepteriet team to ensure that each piece balanced functionality, sustainability, and aesthetics. By embracing the imperfections of the old furniture, the project celebrated the value of reuse and the stories embedded in materials.
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Pencil and Marker
(fig.
Designing for/with
At the start of the project, Stephan advised me to begin by assessing what already exists—measurement standards, commonly used materials, layouts, and the evolution of office furniture design from its original manufacturing to today’s norms. Since the future users of the furniture were broadly defined as typical office workers, the design process was heavily influenced by prevailing industry standards, which often hold significant sway in shaping design decisions.
This led me to reflect on the balance between following norms and challenging them. According to Design Justice: Design Justice in Action, one should design with the user, not for them. However, adhering to established norms, even when they stem from user preferences, can sometimes feel more like reinforcing trends than addressing genuine needs. For instance, standing desks have become common in modern offices, yet research shows they offer limited health benefits compared to practices like maintaining good posture or regular movement. Despite this, some users claim that standing desks and standing meetings enhance their productivity, making their preferences difficult to dismiss.
User Identity
When considering the style of office interiors, design decisions often lean heavily toward minimalism. This approach, while sometimes critiqued for its lack of character, can be essential in defining the identity of the user within shared workspaces. Minimalism fosters consistency and uniformity, elements that are particularly valuable in professional environments where decluttering supports functionality and ergonomics. However, the line between cultural expression and workplace practicality can blur, raising questions about whose identity is represented in these spaces.
The shift toward digitalization has further transformed the identity of the modern office. With less need for furniture dedicated to archiving physical documents, the resulting open spaces demand new approaches to maintain acoustics and visual cohesion. Here, materials such as cork and recycled wool felt emerge as practical and sustainable options, offering sound-absorbing properties while introducing textures that feel familiar and comfortable to users. These choices help balance minimalism with a sense of individuality, subtly reinforcing user identity through tactile and visual familiarity.
Drawing inspiration from the understated yet effective design ethos of Bang magazine (2016), I aimed to integrate visual conventionality as a way to respect the user's need for intuitive, undistracting spaces. By avoiding overly eccentric details, the design choices invite users to project their own identity onto the space, rather than feeling overwhelmed by imposed aesthetics. While I initially considered irregular recycled velvet for its superior sound-absorbing qualities, I ultimately chose to prioritize materials that better harmonize with the user's experience of the space, ensuring that their needs and identity remain central to the design.
Agency
As a designer, I am deeply concerned about maintaining honesty with the user and ensuring that the design concept remains transparent and accessible. Concealing the history of refurbished furniture under a polished facade feels disingenuous, as it erases the narrative of its previous service. While refurbishing can transform a linear life cycle into a circular one, doing so without acknowledgment risks missing an opportunity to challenge the norm and invite the user into the conversation about sustainability.
My role as a designer extends beyond crafting functional and aesthetically pleasing objects—I must also act as a guide, facilitating a deeper understanding and connection between the user and the objects they interact with. By making the recycling aspect of the furniture part of the user experience, I aim to embed the values of circular design not just physically but conceptually into office interiors. This approach encourages contemplation of the consequences of waste and celebrates the beauty of resourcefulness.
To achieve this, I propose coating the worn-out wood of refurbished furniture with a dyed tint lacquer. This coating conserves and memorializes the proof of second-hand usage, preserving scratches, stains, and other marks as visual elements that tell the furniture’s story. By choosing to display these imperfections with pride rather than hiding them, I assert my agency as a designer to shift perceptions of value and beauty. My goal is to challenge the norm by creating designs that not only function within a circular lifespan but also engage the user to see, understand, and relate to the impact of their choices.
Fusion 360
(fig. 4)
Brown Island. (2018). Floating in the white sea.
Falagara, A., & Lindvall, B. (2016). Norm critical design – What is it? ADA.
Power
Design inherently engages with power dynamics, and design activism serves as a means of empowering the designer to challenge and reshape these dynamics. Drawing from Michel Foucault’s concept of knowledge/power (1980), I recognize that the authority wielded by a designer often hinges on access to tools, practices, and research. Without these resources, some designers are disadvantaged, constrained by the norms and standards established within their field. In this project, I reflect on how power manifests, particularly through the established conventions of office interior design, which not only comfort but conform the user to a specific set of expectations.
While my intent is not to discomfort the user, I aim to challenge their viewpoint on recycled furniture. Standards in office design hold significant influence, dictating what feels acceptable or appropriate. However, research provides a counterbalance to this authority, enabling designers to question and critique general practices. Inspired by Steven Heller’s Citizen Designer (2003), I view good design as a vehicle for good citizenship, where dissecting conformity while preserving comfort becomes a central responsibility. Good citizenship in design, in my view, involves questioning the status quo and presenting alternatives that provoke thought while remaining accessible.
One of the most effective ways to mediate power relations in design is through transparency. Transparency not only fosters awareness of design decisions but also builds trust, reducing the tension between designer and user. When users understand how a design is built, they are empowered to engage with it, debate its purpose, and adapt it if needed. As Anna Sofie Mørch Bendixen notes in On the Political Power of the Zine Aesthetic Good, transparency enables empowerment by demystifying the design process and preventing alienation. Transparent designs invite users to see themselves as active participants rather than passive recipients, strengthening their connection to the objects they use.
Design identity plays a crucial role in this dynamic, acting as a milestone for newly implemented decisions. A design with a clear identity is easier to reference and less likely to be perceived as strange, making it more likely to foster acceptance. Passive design, which retains anonymity and simply upholds the status quo, fails to empower the user or provoke meaningful discourse. In contrast, designs that challenge norms while maintaining transparency contribute to design evolution, inviting users into the conversation and allowing power to shift from static conventions to shared, adaptive practices.
What Does It Mean to Be "Broken"?
This experience with the mechanical pencil became a personal reflection on the philosophy of design and the subjective nature of what we perceive as “broken.” Initially, the pencil’s bent lead guide seemed like an irreparable defect, rendering it unusable for its original purpose. It had become more of an artifact than a functional tool—a souvenir of my architectural drawing days. Yet, as I reconsidered its state, I realized that its perceived brokenness was only tied to the expectation that it perform as it was originally manufactured. By detaching the lead guide entirely, I shifted its purpose, transforming its "flaw" into a functional adaptation that aligns with my current needs.
Now, without the lead guide, the pencil requires a gentler touch. If the carbon lead breaks, it signals that I’m pressing too hard—an immediate cue to adjust my pressure and, indirectly, my stress levels while working. What was once a frustrating defect became a tool for mindfulness, teaching me to apply balance and patience. This repurposing made me realize that “broken” is a subjective label, dependent on whether we judge an object by its original function or its potential to serve a new one.
This philosophy extends to design as a whole. Perfectionism, with its fixation on restoring objects to their original state, can halt creativity and limit innovation. When we focus on what an object could be, rather than what it should be, we open new avenues for adaptation and resourcefulness. Instead of mourning the loss of the pencil’s intended functionality, I embraced its transformation, finding value in its new purpose.
This experience reminds me that design need not always seek to restore or conform to a predefined standard of perfection. Sometimes, allowing imperfections to guide new possibilities reveals unexpected solutions and deeper connections to the tools we use. Brokenness, then, becomes not an end but an opportunity for reinvention—a shift in perspective that can lead to meaningful, personal design outcomes.
Heller, S. (2003). Citizen designer. Allworth Press.
Bendixen, A. S. M. (n.d.). On the political power of the zine aesthetic good.