Upica Sofa
2004-05
Materials, GRP, U-Pica Mat®, gel finish
producer, Limited edition by Assa Ashuach studio london

the upica sofa Was bought by private collectors and the British Council for their collections. The Upica sofa was shown in many galleries and museums and was travelling through international venues in Europe and Asia.

The Upica sofa design focuses on the tight relationship between the physical and the visual structure. This object was carefully designed to create structural strength while keeping the essential sculptural elements. The result is a thin and light structure, different from each angle you look at it.
The Upica sofa questions tradition. Technology today helps to simplify design. Alias Studio tools (3D software) gave us the right tools to restrain and simplify a five meter-long line. The Upica sofa is a composition of four lines that creates one compound surface. It is a very slim and large surface that supports itself. If a few millimetres of the surface tight shape were changed, the sofa would collapse like paper.

Tradition gives stability and comfort to the every day life. I believe that as creators of new things, we have to question design each time again and again. Do we really like the chunky armchair? If we do, why? I insist on calling the Upica sofa a sofa and not a bench. The sofa is the largest statue in the living room. Some of the thickness of the upholstery hides the mechanical structure required by an object of this scale. Today we have stress analysis software that can help us to checking the strength of an object when using the minimum amount of material. In the Upica sofa, anything unnecessary has disappeared.
In today’s technological reality, design should be seen also as a strategy for questioning and modifying traditional symbols.
The Upica sofa is made in a unique combination of GRP reinforced U-Pica Mat®. U-Pica Mat® is a low density, non woven continuous strand laminate containing approximately 45% by volume of airy micro-balloons. Together with the GRP the micro-balloons creating a solid micro structure that uses minimum material whilst achieving maximum strength.