Betahaus, Baustelbar #2: The Berliner Hocker

Friday, March 18, 2011.

Last night I visited betahaus in Kreuzberg – home of Open Design City and the Baustelbar series of events. Baustelbar is a night of short presentations, show-and-tell workshops and social interaction, that takes place once a month at betahaus Berlin. The casual cafe setting allows for people of all backgrounds and experience levels to come together in a collaborative dialogue and open creative process, while bonding over beers and DIY drilling.

The evening began with presentations from:
Ronen Kadushin, “The making of the Recent Uploads exhibition Open Design chairs”
Anika Hirt, “rethinking dogma 95 in media art”
Le Van Bo, “Hartz-IV-Möbel”

Shortly following the opening discussion, we converted the charming betahaus cafe into a workshop with Le Van Bo, “Build your own Berliner Hocker.” Inspired by Bauhaus design, the Berliner Hocker is a multifunctional bookshelf / coffee table / chair / stool / drum / or just about anything one can think of. The simplistic design is additionally flexible, as adjustments may be made to its orientation and placement. The possibilities for this clever design are endless and intended to inspire creativity within its users.

Commercial for a non-commercial design project: Hartz IV Moebel – quality of life for everybody. By Le Van Bo and Daniela Kleint.

Le Van Bo presents the Berliner Hocker to the studio.

Drawings by Le Van Bo, courtesy of betahaus.de

“BUY LESS, BUILD MORE!”

Baustelbar #2 studio participants during and following the workshop. All photographs taken on Thursday, March 17, 2011; at the betahaus cafe. Photographs taken by Clare Ros and Robert Gorny.