They gave us pizza. They gave us breadsticks. Before you could complain of fatigue—the Jacuzzi brothers revolutionised the concept of whirlpool baths with jet sprays. But the list doesn’t end there as you have another illustrious invention to thank the Italians for: bean bag chairs.
The latter comes as a surprise to many, and with good reason. Surely, the floppy silhouette of the bean bag chair makes for a better fit with the laid-back joie de vivre of American culture than the stiff upper lip of Italian high design? But when the design trio of Piero Gatti, Cesare Paolini and Franco Teodoro first set out to imagine seating that could mould itself to the body, they had little idea where the quest for answers would take them. Water mattresses? Pressurised air? Ultimately, they sought inspiration from the old mattresses of fore stuffed with chestnut leaves by peasants. After oscillating between a wide range of ideas from buckshot to tiny ping-pong balls, they finally found a winner: synthetic PVC beads. Titled Sacco and produced by Italian company Zanotta, they could scarcely fathom the stratospheric success that awaited their teardrop-shaped universal seat.
The Rise & Fall Of Bean Bag Culture
Fast-forward to a few decades later, and the humble bean bag had occupied an ubiquitous spot in our collective psyche. Teenagers and bachelors flopped themselves on this shapeless silhouette for all-night marathons in their gaming dens. Parents favoured this silhouette for the delightful lack of sharp edges around their little ones. Before any murmurs about the lack of lumbar support could arise, manufacturers had niftily replaced the PVC pellets with body-hugging memory foam. It wasn’t long before the words ‘beanbag 26407383’ started popping up as street art and graffiti in Mumbai—an ingenious marketing play by a local brand, Beanbagwala.
And it wasn’t just the masses who rejoiced either. Bean bags soon made themselves indispensable in the design lexicon, with a mink iteration popping up in the Paris apartment of the late Italian Vogue editor, Franca Sozzani. New-age alternatives sheathed in suede, velvet and sheepskin soon gave this dorm room staple a bougie makeover. So, what went wrong?
Rajiv Parekh, founding partner of reD, has witnessed the evolution of bean bags in India but never found himself favourably inclined towards the trend. “Bean bags simply kept moving around and felt like office chairs left to do their own dance, making the spaces look dishevelled. No matter what posture I took in them, the slightest amount of shifting necessitated a realignment of the bean bag. As someone who tosses and turns a million times every night, it was odd and uncomfortable,” he reminisces.
Interior designer Annkur Khosla echoes the sentiment. While the one-size-fits-all nature of this sink-in silhouette made this a staple in Indian households, she has since found that the appetite for comfortable seating has evolved. “There has also been an influx of Japanese-inspired seating in the India design scene. People are now favouring lower, floor-style seating that still offers some form of back support,” she observes. Among her round-up of contemporary favourites, she counts the Togo fireside chair from Ligne Roset that offers all-foam cushioned seating without any sharp edges.
The Road Forward
So, what comes next for the ergonomic economy? According to Shailly Mandiwal, home furnishing direction leader at IKEA India, lounge chairs and versatile seating solutions are becoming increasingly popular. In response, the brand’s portfolio is championing seating options that offer optimal support, like the EKOLSUND recliner. She also predicts that the demand for multi-purpose pieces like pouffes and footrests with storage will continue to soar. “Unlike bean bags, easy chairs offer the added convenience of effortless transitions in and out of the seat, making them a preferred choice for those seeking both comfort and accessibility,” she says.
For those who are still clinging on to the last vestiges of allegiance to the bean bag chair, all hope is not yet lost. At Milan Design Week 2024, heads turned at the sight of Meritalia’s Shadow armchair—doused in glossy red vinyl and constructed without a mould to adapt to the body that sits on it. The bean bag may have been flopped in a forgotten corner of the modern design spectrum, but its outside-the-box approach to contemporary seating continues to live on.
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