2_1_DiscoverGermany_August2014_Issue17:Scan Magazine 1
31/7/14
14:27
Page 14
Xilobis Intelligent and flexible furniture design according to customers’needs Often static, traditional furniture does not give much leeway for creativity and change. At the other end of the spectrum, Xilobis makes furniture that does the exact opposite, giving you a flexible and easy-to-handle system. Different components can not only be combined according to the customer’s needs but also changed as often as one likes, without affecting its high quality and stability.
Specially fitted cables and chrome steel balls connect the furniture parts
TEXT: JESSICA HOLZHAUSEN | PHOTOS: XILOBIS
It all began with a vision to create a sustainable and flexible furniture system made from valuable quality materials but without the need for screws or metal fittings. While still meeting modern design standards, the plan was to make tools unnecessary for assembling or deconstructing the furniture. With Xilobis furniture this vision soon became a reality and in 2003 the first prototype was exhibited at the sample fair in Basel. A year later, the inventors united under the brand name Xilobis and at the same time began to improve the system even further.
14 | Issue 17 | August 2014
In 2007 the corporation Xilobis was founded. In 2010 it went online with an internet-based configuration system that is part of the firm’s success today.
Xilobis does not offer one particular piece of furniture but a modular construction system that allows customers to create what they need.The system to build the separate modules is an easy one. Take, for example, a cubic bookshelf consisting of four sides: top, bottom, left and right. To put these four together, a cable loop is firstly wound around three of the four parts to connect them. If now a fourth part – for example, the still missing top – is put in its place the specially fitted cable tightens around the four sides holding them firmly in their place. Now the backside is added which gives the shelf ad-