Dauphin's new office chair Indeed encourages correct sitting in the workplace

Recently we have become acquainted with the office from a new angle: it has moved into our homes and brought with it its digital tools and ergonomic furniture. Many have experienced the transfer as a struggle to balance the aesthetic with the functional, and space and flexibility with domestic comfort. Things we once perceived as self-evident archetypes in places dedicated exclusively to work now seem like a foreign bodies in the home office.

Under these changed environmental conditions for work, furniture may and can also change: it should fit in different environments. It should be mobile within the given space and dynamically adapt to the owner. It should be durable, sustainable and reliable – and yet not appear overly functional looking, despite the sophisticated technology. Dauphin encapsulates this contemporary furniture typology with the aim of achieving 'aesthetic excellence' – and shows what the strategy looks like in practice with the Indeed swivel chair for the office.

It was created by in-house designer Rüdiger Schaack: ‘With Indeed , we have managed to develop a chair that is aimed at the entry-level segment, but still features a great design throughout.’ Schaack paid particular attention to the details and created elegant solutions for even the less obvious elements, such as the backrest support. ‘Here there are clear edges that vanish in the surface, just like automotive design,’ he explains. ‘Or the smooth transition from the backrest support to the back, creating a coherent overall design concept. The lordosis pad is another feature that characterises the chair and outwardly conveys the lightness of the design: with this broken mesh structure that gets a little bit narrower towards the outside, just like with items of clothing or shoes.’ All the details come together to form a slender silhouette and ensure that the chair fits the given context without putting itself in the foreground. As summed up by Schaack, ‘We wanted to develop a chair whose design language is not too expressive.’

Thanks to the understated design, many of the intelligent ergonomic features are not necessarily obvious at first glance, but can be experienced through use. The idea is that the chair can be adapted to different work situations just as it adjusts to different users – with a quick and targeted touch. These include features like backrest counterpressure, pre-selectable active seat-tilt adjustment and flexible adjustment of the seat depth.

Schaack explains how the intuitive operation works with Indeed. ‘One vital aspect was for the backrest to be height-adjustable. This is the solution we came up with: there is an EasyTouch function which allows you to slide the backrest up very easily without pressing buttons. And when it gets right to the top, you can guide it back down again to its original position .’ In addition to supporting and relieving the back and musculoskeletal system, Indeed addresses a more broadly defined function of office chairs: the motivation to move.

Every second workstation is currently a desk-based setup that forces the body into a sitting posture for 40 hours a week. Office furniture must respond to a variety of work situations in today’s more flexible context. And it should remind us of the most important question: am I moving? And if so: is it enough? Seating furniture then becomes an assistant for ergonomic self-performance that keeps the body from 'parking' on the chair. This need is perfectly fulfilled by Indeed’s 3D-Move feature: the elastic, three-dimensionally yielding backrest dynamically follows the lateral movements of the sitter.

For a chair specifically addressing a target group that views the office from an agile, flexible and future-oriented perspective, the inner values are similarly important. In addition to design, ergonomics and technology, the aspects of materials and sustainability were also given special consideration in the development of Indeed. This starts with the materials that come from the immediate vicinity of the Dauphin factory – and continues with transport. Space-saving cardboard boxes cut down on CO2 emissions by increasing lorry load capacities, while the chair’s design is reduced to a small number of components that can be dismantled, facilitating quick assembly and disassembly without tools, not only during initial transport but also during subsequent moves.

Dauphin has also been able to save 20 per cent in weight by using an intelligent lightweight construction method. With Tonal, the manufacturer offers an upholstery fabric that transforms 10-14 old PET bottles into a new product life with each chair. Here too, Dauphin shows that Indeed is not a piece of furniture that stands for one grand gesture. Instead, it proves that it is the many small things that together make up quality: from design and ergonomics to sustainability.

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