Coffee Table
Memory of place, iconic Perth, Indian Ocean, Fremantle Doctor, summers day, wind, cool change.
“Imagine that you are at a Perth beach on a very hot summers day. The ocean is silky smooth, and the water is dead flat and crystal clear. Out towards the horizon you notice a change in the texture and colour of the water with white caps appearing. After some time, the white caps and this change in texture comes nearer and nearer. As those white caps come closer, they become more frequent as you realise the wind is about to change direction with the incoming sea breeze bringing a cool change.” That statement encapsulates the imagining behind the design of ‘White Caps’ coffee table.
The design service provided by Neil Cownie included concept design, prototypes and detailed design in the realisation of this unique letterbox.
CLIENT BRIEF
Neil’s ‘White Caps’ coffee table was one of nine items of furniture and art objects from Western Australian designers commissioned by Mobilia + Caesarstone that were available for purchase through a digital auction. Each of the nine designers donated their own time in designing these objects.
All proceeds from the auction went to the charity, Camp Quality to give kids with cancer the chance to be kids again, with the ‘White Caps’ table achieving the highest price at auction amongst the available objects.
HISTORY OF PLACE AND PEOPLE
If you have spent as much time on Perth’s beaches as I have, you will be familiar with the cycles of the seasons, the changes in tides, wind direction and resulting effect on the ocean.
If there is such a thing anymore as a ‘typical summers day’ in this man-made changing climate, the day would begin with often strong easterly winds, cool at first until into the morning they would bring hot wind from farther inland. How hot the day would become was determined by how long these hot easterly winds continued before the cooling wind of the ‘Freo Doctor’ (sea breeze) over the Indian Ocean from the southwest.
Often there would be a period of reprieve when the easterly winds would subside, and the ocean would be silky smooth before the incoming cool winds commenced. When on the beach, you were always given brief forewarning of the impending cool change as in the distance just before the horizon, you could see the speckled white marks of the white caps resulting from the colling winds moving towards you.
It is this every day beachside experience, the cycle of nature in this specific place in which I live that has inspired the design of the white Caps table.
ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN
The table represents the ‘white caps’ of a windblown ocean against the silky-smooth water surface before the sea breeze. Stone inlay creates the patchwork of the ocean, both smooth and textured, complete with white caps. The table base also represents the form of a stylised white cap.
Dimensions:
600 mm high table with a 700 mm diameter tabletop.
Materials:
Entirely fabricated from Caesarstone off-cuts.
Caesarstone colours:
Symphony Grey (main colour), White Attica, Noble Gray, Turbine Grey.
Stone Mason:
The table was expertly fabricated by Marble & Cement Works who donated their contribution of the fabrication.
SUSTAINABILITY
All materials have been sourced as offcuts. This material would have otherwise gone to waste.
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