Studio Marion<\/a> was established in 2018, drawing upon Nicole\u2019s extensive experience in furniture design and product development that included roles at EQ3 in Winnipeg and Gus Modern in Toronto. She credits the geographical isolation and harsh winters of her home city with fostering a thriving community of local artists and designers. \u201cMaybe this leads to a simplicity or calmness, a streamlining of materials, a lack of decoration. It gets into your soul somehow,\u201d Nicole reflects.<\/p>\nNicole namechecks the light-filled architecture of California\u2019s mid-century Eichler houses and the colourful textiles and paper sculptures of Stockholm designer Clara von Zweigbergk as influential to her aesthetic. Yet she is equally inspired by everyday interactions with her friends and her two children. \u201cI think about them bumping their heads on things, especially when they were younger,\u201d she says. \u201cSharp edges on tables can be very impractical.\u201d<\/p>\n
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You won\u2019t find any sharp edges on the Percy chair. Initially developed as a self-initiated project, an early version was awarded Best Prototype at Toronto\u2019s Interior Design Show in 2020. Confident and unfussy, the chair\u2019s steel frame offers an eye-catching contrast with its invitingly supportive cushions. Yet the sturdy powder-coated tubing also hints at playground climbing adventures, while the front legs seem poised and ready to burst into life. Nicole remembers the reaction at design shows to the chair\u2019s tactile qualities: \u201cPeople immediately walk up to it and either firmly grab those arms, or gently run their hands along them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Function may come first, but doesn\u2019t rule out fun. \u201cIt\u2019s about doing slightly unexpected or exaggerated things. With Percy, nothing is there that doesn\u2019t need to be. All of the lines, the metal bar that goes around the frame: there\u2019s nothing extra. The playfulness comes from the diameter of the tube, the puffiness of the upholstery and the rounded leg bottoms.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nicole worked with NaughtOne to refine the Percy prototype, adjusting the seating to a more relaxed angle and softening the cushions which, she says, were already inspired by \u201cmarshmallows and cotton candy\u201d. With a shared ethos of sustainability, the chair\u2019s internal frame is made from fast-growing birch and the steel tubing can be repaired or repainted if needed. Nicole also enjoyed rendering the design in some of the myriad colour combinations NaughtOne offers. While she is mostly drawn to the tone-on-tone pairings such as pink on pink \u2013 \u201cIt just looks like a candy that I want to eat\u201d \u2013 the possibilities of contrasting ones excite her too. \u201cThe blue frame with the white upholstery looks amazing. It will be really interesting to see what colour combinations people gravitate towards.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maybe one day, Nicole ponders, the Percy will itself provide a comfortable seat in a doctor\u2019s waiting room. But she feels that it will make itself at home anywhere. \u201cWhat I hear people saying about the chair is, \u2018It\u2019s so simple. It\u2019s almost as though this chair always existed.\u2019 I feel that\u2019s a really good sign.\u201d<\/p>\n
Enquire now<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2023\/11\/NOPRC_Geiger-Capri-Snow_RAL1032_TRA800D_EVER22A_ALCHB5S_MSDG344_LR.jpg\")
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Nicole Marion tells NaughtOne how prairie skies and marshmallows inspired Percy, a chair that doesn\u2019t wait to make an impression.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13618,"featured_media":24867,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[110,107],"tags":[111,112],"class_list":["post-24864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-designer-interview","category-product-launch","tag-nicole-marion","tag-percy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13618"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24864"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24864\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naughtone.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}