Transparent chairs have always been very attractive. Maybe because we imagine to see, through them, another world that probably doesn't even exist. A world we don't properly see but that we can imagine through the transparency of the chair structure, and that it can make us experience fascinating feelings.
Needless to say, for a transparent chair traditional materials are useless: there's always glass and crystal, yes, but just try to imagine for a moment a house full of glass chairs! Glass is a rather fragile, heavy and, let's face it, dangerous material for an object as a chair, that we always move around and use in the most different contexts. Glass and crystal are fantastic materials for tables tough, as they are static and usually better treated.
For this reason, transparent chairs can by definition be realized only with plastic materials: only these materials, infact, allow chairs to be practical and pleasant to see at the same time.
Despite nowadays we are quite used to plastic materials which, from the second half of the 20th century brought real revolutions in our life, we still treat them with skepticism. We treat plastic as an inferior category, with less quality and not particular resistant. These are obviously all urban myths: the technical progress of the last decades made plastic materials extremely resistant and functional, absolutely suitable for accessories and furnishing objects.
Polycarbonate, technopolymer, methacrylate: difficult names, with very complex compositions and manufacturing processes, but with extremely positive things in common. Strength of material, shock resistance, waterproof, very easy to clean: all these characteristics are exceptional and extremely useful for objects as chairs, that are often moved from indoor to outdoor, that have to support sometimes high weights, that are subject to shocks and potential damages in every moment.
It's also important to say that plastic materials are harder to dispose of, but technical progress is already working on it and probably these materials are going to be ecologic soon (some of them already are).
At any rate, it's not just a question of practicality and technical characteristics: plastic materials really are good-looking. I know a lot of people find aesthetic beauty only in wood, stone or iron (materials with a great and long history and obviously with an everlasting charm) but I can firmly say that plastic can create surprising visual effects that are not only pleasant but also spectacular!
Joining plastic to the lightness of transparency, maybe with touches of elusive yet strong colours, gives life to an incomparable marriage, with a charm that is completely different from wood or iron.
For example L'Eau transparent chair by Calligaris is an aesthetic and emotional masterpiece: a vision able to evoke almost physical sensations, L'Eau concretely communicate the meaning of its name.
Alchemia stackable chair by Calligaris in polycarbonate or nylon shows once more plastic materials versatility in realizing different and engaging shapes.
La Marie transparent chair by Kartell in polycarbonate exalts the beauty of coloured plastic together with its formal simplicity, making this chair the protagonist of a minimal dining room.
Aria chair in transparent polycarbonate by Bontempi greatly represents how plastic can evoke natural elements, with their movement but also with their static nature, with their fluidity and lightness.
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