Doughnut seat wins Chair Affair competition

Design contest involves using corrugated packaging

Furniture Today Staff -- Furniture Today, June 26, 2009

WASHINGTON — A doughnut-shaped chair made of strips of cardboard has won this year's Chair Affair competition, sponsored by the International Corrugated Packaging Foundation and administered by the American Institute of Architecture Students.

Jessica Leung’s Hole ‘n Hole design took first place in the Chair Affair competition.

Vern Yip, star of The Learning Channel's "Trading Spaces" and HGTV's "Deserving Design" and "Design Star Fame," announced the winners. He'll present them at a press conference here July 23, and they'll be on display in the National Building Museum in Washington July 23-26.

Organizers say the Chair Affair "was developed as a competition to introduce architectural students to exciting structural design careers in the corrugated packaging and display industry." Yip is the honorary chairman of the competition.

The 2009 winners include:

First place: "Hole 'n Hole," Jessica Leung, Cuesta College

Second place (tie): "A Corrugated Chair," Sarah Clement and Michael Wallace, Louisiana State University

Second place (tie): "Profile and Silhouette," Winston Mi and Jessica Brown, The Rhode Island School of Design

Honorable mentions include: "Caterpillared," Brad Smith, Cuesta College; "Adjustable," Keith Holman, Benjamin Shullaw, Neal Birchum and Sean McDow, The University of Oklahoma; "Corrugated Board Chair," Jonathan Coop, California State University Long Beach; and "Studio Furniture: The Scissor Chair," Mateusz Dzierzanowski and Christopher Brown, The Catholic University of America.

Merit Award recipients include students from San Jose State University, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, The University of Texas, Austin, Appalachian State University and The University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

The top 10 teams split a cash prize pot of $4,500, including $1,500 to the winner.