Konstantin Grcic developed the Myto chair in collaboration with Plank and BASF, using a new PBT plastic.
Myto was developed in collaboration with the Italian furniture producer Plank and BASF. The chair is made entirely from the engineering plastic Ultradur® High Speed (polybutylene terephthalate – PBT) which has an extraordinary flowability. MYTO will be introduced to the public for the first time at the K 2007 [plastics industry] trade fair.
The project was started in late summer 2006, when BASF invited four renowned designers, including internationally acclaimed German designer Konstantin Grcic, to a joint workshop – Universal Days – in Ludwigshafen. The aim was to explain the creative potential of BASF’s engineering plastics – the “ultras”. The properties of the material were demonstrated to the designers using everyday examples. This demonstration didn’t consist only of graphs and figures but explained practical properties such as rigidity, strength, viscosity, thermoforming abilities and the mutual dependencies of these properties.
During the following months the experts at BASF and Konstantin Grcic [KGID] developed the idea of using the special properties of Ultradur® High Speed for an industrially manufactured design product. They soon agreed that a chair would be the greatest challenge for a project such as this – not just in terms of manufacturing, but also in regard to the design. Chairs are design icons, but they are still everyday objects. Konstantin Grcic believes that chairs should not only fulfill a purpose – they also have a personality. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, one of the most outstanding architects of the 20th century, once said that it is more difficult to design a chair than a complete building.
Grcic chose the typology of the cantilever chair as a reference. The particular strength and high flowability of the plastic enable a unique transition from a thick to a thin cross-section. The chair which is produced as a monoblock presents a stable frame into which the seat and the backrest fit perfectly with their net-like perforations.
The MYTO chair was designed by KGID for Plank using Ultradur® High Speed from BASF which has an extraordinary flowability.
text & photo: KGID
