News

-Five new park bench prototypes by Scotland based designers Rekha Maker, C.A Walac, Dress for the Weather & Stefanie Cheong, Chris Dobson and James Rigler to be unveiled in the grounds of Mount Stuart on the Isle of Bute on July 9th and installed until October 15th 2022

-Commissioned by Design Exhibition Scotland, the five benches respond to Mount Stuart’s architectural materials, landscape and the traditional historical design methods used in the Isle of Bute

-Materials include locally sourced wood and quarried sandstone, recycled plastic, marbled jesmonite, ceramics, and scrap metal

Sitting Pretty is a new project by Design Exhibition Scotland to showcase ambitious new park bench designs as part of a temporary exhibition at Mount Stuart on the Isle of Bute. Running from 9 July until 15 October, five new benches have been created by Scotland-based design talent.

This project complements Mount Stuart’s long tradition of commissioning site-specific installations. Through an open call that received over 60 submissions, Design Exhibition Scotland prompted Scottish designers to produce original benches for Mount Stuartreflecting on the potential of these objects to connect people to nature, offering the luxury of calmness and stillness in an ever-changing and fast-paced world. Park benches are used to explore alternative lifestyles focused on wellbeing and community values as the design structures ground users in the natural landscape encouraging reflections on human relations.

Four design teams were selected to create four outdoor benches; while as part of a separate commission artist and designer James Rigler has designed a new indoor bench for the interior of Mount Stuart House. The selection panel for the open call was Sophie Crichton Stuart, chair of Mount Stuart Trust; Sophie McKinlay, director of programme, V&A Dundee; artist & designer, James Rigler & Susanna Beaumont, Director, Design Exhibition Scotland.

Together they looked for designs that celebrate all that the public bench offers: the joy of sitting outside, the great outdoors & public space; the chance to pause for thought, take in a view, read a book & eat a sandwich or a place to meet with friends. And of course, that the park bench should celebrate good design & well-crafted materials.

Susanna Beaumont, Director Design Exhibition Scotland commented “There’s something so generous about a bench. Benches offer the possibility that somebody can sit next to you creating a kind of hospitality of the outdoors. You could be there on your own, chatting with a friend or eating a sandwich: but there’s something in that sense of a bench for all. A bench is a piece of sculpture and then you sit on it and it’s a functional object.

I was really delighted that we had such a brilliant range of proposals. We had established architectural firms, design collectives, recent graduates and celebrated Scottish designers. In all its variations it was a wonderful opportunity to riff on something that is commonplace.

The four successful designs selected from the open call are very different but each share a clear vision, and a unique take on the brief. In addition thanks to further funding from Hope Scott Trust, Design Exhibition Scotland then approached James Rigler to create an indoor bench responding to the stunning interior of the Marble Hall at Mount Stuart.

I hope the selected benches can act as prototypes to be replicated and to populate urban and natural spaces in Scotland creating further opportunities for the emerging designers involved. Until then I look forward to the design wowing visitors to Mount Stuart over the summer.”

Sophie Crichton Stuart, Chair of Mount Stuart Trust said:

"Mount Stuart Trust is delighted to collaborate on this project with Design Exhibition Scotland providing the opportunity for prototyping and exhibiting public seating and developing innovative design skills. It is a pleasure to be involved.”

The relationship with nature and with the specific landscape of Mount Stuart is encouraged through the chosen materials locally sourced or openly inspired by the Gothic architecture of the building and its acres of gardens and woodlands. Combining traditional design techniques with highly technologically advanced methods, the design teams show an interest in developing a sustainable practice to create viable approaches to the use of natural and artificial materials.

The park bench designs are:

Rekha Maker VISTA

Jesmonite & fibreglass Rekha Maker creates a space of social encounter in her multi-functional bench that combines places to sitand flat surfaces to place picnics and books. The bench expresses the overall interest of Rekha Barry-founder of Rekha Maker -to create functional design objects. A Bench for Space & Coming Together responds to the desire for community-making as the sitting and the table areas face each other encouraging social interactions and the coming together of its users. The designer also ensures that the picnic areas are accessible to wheelchair users. The bench references the colour palette of Mount Stuart’s Marble Hall as the jesmonite layering of the structure resembles the abundance of marble types in the Victorian Gothic building.“This is the biggest work I've made for Rekha Maker and I'm over the moon with how it's turned out. It's been quite an undertaking and I've learned so much along the way. Designed to reflect the sumptuous palette of the Marble Hall inside the house, I've worked to create a piece of luxury for everyone outside. The arched inserts allow wheelchair users to use the benches too as a surface to place picnics/maps. There are two amazing views here so it was important that the benches looked in both directions, towards the house and the Japanese gardens. This commission has been a catalyst to make me think bigger and I can’t wait to continue working on new designs at this scale.”

C.A. Walac Bending your knees without falling

Scrap metal.

Scavenging materials in a 0.01 miles radius from her Glasgow studio, both with a sculptor’s eye and a designer’s mind, C.A. Walac revisits abstract waste by recutting, reshaping, recomposing and recontextualizing found scraps. Sustainability is less about imposing ideas to material than being open to opportunities. The benches’ forms and functions evolved during the process of assembly where finding joy, special features and unexpected beauty lied in randomness. This process created a park seat that doubles as a 360° abstract sculpture.The designer envisioned the bench as a functional object to offer multiple viewpoints: gazing at the facade of the building and towards the landscape of the Firth of Clyde and beyond. The bench offers a space to temporarily inhabit the outdoors and allow the sitter to regenerate.

C.A. Walac said: “Free rest, free view, free life. It will catch a bit of our weight, for minutes or hours, so we can feel lighter. Just for a moment.”

Dress for the Weather x Stefanie Cheong ‘Stone + Plastic Bench 01 + 02’

Reclaimed sandstone, 100% recycled plastic In their collaboration, Andy Campbell of Dress for the Weather and Stefanie Cheong questioned how to connect geological material from the deep past with the most prevalent pollutant of the Anthropocene: plastic. The resulting bench combines a base of Sandstone and an inlaid plastic seat made of recycled waste. The structure visualises the geological strata of the Island of Bute combining geological eras from deep past and present to raise awareness about a more sustainable future.

This collaborative piece of design combines Dress for the Weather’s interest in connecting ecology and construction and Stefanie Cheong work that explores rock formation.The materials are locally sourced using reclaimed Sandstone from the Ambrisbeg quarry in Bute and recycled plastic.

Responding to the geology of the Isle of Bute, Dress for the Weather x Stefanie Cheong’s benches are formed from a monolithic piece of Devonian sandstone which dates back 400 million years. Inspired to design a bench that disrupts classical ideals of the pleasure garden and the carefully cultivated and well-ordered landscapes often seen within the grounds of stately houses, Dress for the Weather x Stefanie Cheong’s collaboration melds together the geological past with one of the most ubiquitous pollutants of the Anthropocene era –plastic.Working with Bute’s Ambrisbeg quarry, they sourced sandstone salvaged from a demolished church which once stood in Rothesay and tooled it into two bench-like forms. The plastic inlay is 100% PET and made from recycled packaging. It provides a wipeable seat and warmth when compared to often cold stone. And both the stone and the plastic seat complement each other functionally but provide a visually arresting juxtaposition of two materials: one from the deep past and the other the present day.“We were inspired to design a bench that disrupts classical ideals of the pleasure garden and the carefully cultivated, well-ordered landscapes often seen within the grounds of stately houses. Our bench melds together the geological past with one of the most ubiquitous pollutants of the Anthropocene era –plastic. The benches are formed from two monolithic pieces of Devonian sandstone which dates back 400 million year.

Working with Bute’s Ambrisbeg quarry, we sourced sandstone salvaged from a demolished church which once stood in Rothesay and tooled it into two bench-like forms. The plastic inlay is 100% PET and made from recycled packaging. It provides a wipeable seat and warmth when compared to often cold stone. The stone and the plastic seat complement each other functionally but provide a visually arresting juxtaposition of two materials: one from the deep past and the other the present day.”

“We were inspired to design a bench that disrupts classical ideals of the pleasure garden and the carefully cultivated, well-ordered landscapes often seen within the grounds of stately houses. Our bench melds together the geological past with one of the most ubiquitous pollutants of the Anthropocene era – plastic.

The benches are formed from two monolithic pieces of Devonian sandstone which dates back 400 million year. Working with Bute’s Ambrisbeg quarry, we sourced sandstone salvaged from a demolished church which once stood in Rothesay and tooled it into two bench-like forms. The plastic inlay is 100% PET and made from recycled packaging. It provides a wipeable seat and warmth when compared to often cold stone. The stone and the plastic seat complement each other functionally but provide a visually arresting juxtaposition of two materials: one from the deep past and the other the present day.”

Chris DobsonMonolith 2022

Scottish larch cross-laminated timber with larch dowels

The designer situates his bench within local design traditions weaving together the hand-made Orkney Chair designs with more recent brutalist concrete bus shelters found on the Isle of Lewis. The structure offers a welcoming embrace and great comfort to the visitors of Mount Stuart to enjoy the landscape in any weather conditions. The bench uses MassTimber: a technological sustainable alternative to high carbon structures like steel and concrete.

With the establishment of BE-ST (formerly Construction Scotland Innovation Centre), new possibilities of homegrown supply of this material type are opening up. Combining local producers with locally sourced wood from Scottish forestry, Mass Timber provides the means to create robust, sustainable and simply constructed structures. Dobson proposes this bench to stand as a prototype of cross laminated homegrown Scottish Larch, further exploring the means for this to be applied to the construction of dwellings to find alternative solutions to the housing crisis as the lack of affordable and sustainable homes is becoming a serious concern in Scotland, particularly in more rural locations.“

Benches can also represent a means to increase public awareness of such timber construction technology and it is exciting to consider the prospect of scaling this to the provision of contemporary, well-designed and attainable homes for those in most need, whilst also supporting local industry and drawing upon the nation's natural resources.”

James Rigler Passing Bench, 2022

Glazed ceramic, timber, aluminium leaf, faux fur.

Rigler presents the only indoor bench as part of Sitting Pretty thanks to an independent commission supported by the Hope Scott Trust inside Mount Stuart’s Marble Hall. The designer responded to the space of the hall with its marble columns, Gothic arches and blue ceiling scattered with crystal stars and Zodiac motifs. Rigler's bench, with its silver ceramic legs and faux-fur upholstery, echoes the Hall’s decorative elements but offers something uncanny and theatrical. His bench encourages visitors to sit and gaze skywards to embracefully the celestial sight offered by the hall ceiling, but it also offers a hint of the intense,Gothic atmosphere of Mount Stuart's spectacular interiors.

“I’m interested in the dual meaning of ‘passing’:something passing by, or being taken for something it's not. This bench attempts to do both. I liked the idea of furniture that speaks the same decorative language as Mount Stuart, yet doesn't quite fit. The imitative materials, exaggerated colours and comic form produce a seductive but unsettling presence. The intense, brooding atmosphere of the house, which hints at hidden secrets and mysterious rituals, challenges visitors to decipher and imitate its fantastical language. I'm always attempting to pass this test, to 'pass' as a favoured guest, while I pass through the house's spaces. The Passing Bench is attempting this, too."