Industrial furniture made from machinery - photos and video

[Jon]

I think I can add "industrial" to the very small window of furniture design that I can tolerate, along with "log" and "minimalist".

Here we have an industrial scissor lift table from Restoration Hardware; around $2,000, depending on size and finish. It doesn't exactly look like high-quality work, but the aesthetic is not bad. RH is careful with their phrasing; perhaps they want the buyer to think that this is "repurposed" furniture, but they can't legally say that. The description starts: "We've reproduced and repurposed". Hmmmmmm...


More: https://www.restorationhardware.com/...tId=prod690020

Another interesting RH piece, around $500. I guess, hmmm...I don't know. It looks cool. Would it be comfortable to sit on? Would this work in a house with children? Again we have the sketchy phrasing in the description: "The sculptural forms of massive truck springs, discovered in a salvage yard, inspired this witty take on industrial seating." So I guess it's not really built from "discovered" truck springs, but that the springs served as an inspiration.


More: https://www.restorationhardware.com/...egoryId=search

Let's take a look at Vintage Industrial on Etsy.com. They also have their own website: https://www.retro.net. Looks like they're doing quite well - many of their furniture pieces sell for over $10,000. Per their website, they say that they don't actually "repurpose" pieces, and that "all of the bases you see are new", but that the finishes are antiqued. The pricing, aesthetic, and naming convention (note the flagship "Bronx" table) indicate that they're being marketed to hip wealthy Manhattanites hunting for an "industrial loft" look.

Here's a $9,000 Hure crank desk. The "Hure" marking is a reference to Pierre Hure, a French machinist who manufactured beautiful machinery in the late 1800s (more here). Again, these are not original Hure machine bases, but antiqued reproductions.



And here we have a $15,000 "Bronx" crank table. This is with a concrete top:


A 64-second video from Vintage Industrial:

Those of you who have a practiced nose for sniffing out old machinery might consider making a piece of furniture or two and seeing if you can capture a bit of this market on Etsy.com, possibly even distinguishing yourself by using original machinery. You can also use it as an excuse to bring some old machinery in the house, while presenting the above as proof to your spouse of your sophisticated taste in furnishings.