Drawings and photographic material, Lotus, sofa 蓮花（沙發）繪圖及影像資料

A tour de force of sculptural seating design, Umeda Masanori’s Lotus sofa was only ever realised as a prototype, though it informed his well-known Flower series of seating for the Italian manufacturer Edra, which entered production one year later. Evoking the lotus imagery found in Hindu and Buddhist tradition, in which the flower symbolises the ideal of enlightenment as a seat for divine beings, the sofa’s central circular cushion is ringed by upholstered petals that serve as the arms and backrest. Umeda’s drawings and models illustrate the process by which he carefully worked out the design’s elaborate construction, which furthered his explorations of the sculptural possibilities of polyurethane foam.

This series consists of two sketches and a design drawing, along with a set of photographs of a model of the sofa.