Melange cushion | pixel

The Melange cushion is a fusion of Scandinavian design and traditional Thai crafts. Melange is a hand-woven cushion available in six different patterns. The cushion is the result of a collaboration between designer Nina Jobs, the Kids Ark organization in north-western Thailand and Design House Stockholm.

Kids Ark was founded in 2000 in Chiang Mai province by Swedes Rita Holm Gustafsson and Allan Gustafsson with a view to improving the desperate situation faced by children who had lost their parents due to HIV/Aids. What started as a sponsorship programme to enable orphaned children living with relatives to attend school has grown to include activities that make it possible for women to work together to increase their incomes by making crafts, thereby improving the home conditions for the orphaned children.

“Ultimately, what it is about as far as I am concerned, is creating a product that can be made using their techniques,” Nina Jobs explains. The project has been a challenge to them since the Melange cushions does not represent their usual world of colours and designs.
“Even when I work with colour it is toned down. The women suggested that we would make the patterns more colourful so we tried out some bolder colours but we twisted the yarn and thereby achieved a tweed effect.”