Poolside icon: a contemporary take on a classic umbrella

There's more to outdoor furniture than weather proofing. Well, the best kind anyway. Outdoor furniture is not for the quotidian, for the day to day, unless you are peculiarly blessed by location. It is there for the good times, for fresh air morning coffees, long summer lunches with friends and family, and dusky sundowners. It is there to create and frame special moments.

It has to have, alongside all that hardy resilience, something of the fantasy about it, something escapist. Matching fantasy with modern materials and leave-out-in-the-rain practicality is the mission of Italian outdoor specialist cbdesign. (And who, after all, has understood the full, fantastic potential of outdoor living better than the Italians).

Cbdesign was established in 2002 but its purpose has really been to reimagine and reengineer the design approach defined during outdoor furniture’s golden era, the two decades between 1950 and 1970.

Mid-century modernism’s foundational designers, Hans Wegner, Eero Aarnio and Mies Van Der Rohe, made woven cane, rattan and rope a staple ingredient of their furniture designs, attracted by their texture, hardiness, hand-craft credentials and the complex, graphic patterns they could create. These materials and techniques had long been used in colonial outdoor furniture and the trick of the modernist designers was to bring outdoor designs inside.

The ‘modernisation’ of outdoor furniture though really happens with the post-war rise of resort chic and villa retreats, of poolside glamour on the Cote D’Azur and elegant sun-dappled lounging on terraces overlooking the Tuscan hills. Out with heavy rattan armchairs, (while rejecting the utilitarian discomforts of the foldaway deck chair), modern outdoor furniture was lighter and both more elegant and relaxed.

Cbdesign took the makings of woven outdoor furniture and modernised them again. It developed synthetic cording which looks and feels like cane but delivers far more in the way of rugged resilience. It’s UV resistant, waterproof, shrugs off extreme temperatures and, just as crucially, it keeps its colour, come rain or shine. It also developed synthetic rope for bulkier weaves and refined aluminium frames.

All the while though, it maintained a commitment to hand-crafting and increasing the curve, cradle and comfort of outdoor chairs and sofas. (Not that cbdesign has gave up completely on natural materials. Some of its ranges feature teak frames and rope macrame, handmade in Java, mixed with synthetic materials).

The brand’s latest release is again a contemporary take on a classic design, a poolside/beachfront sun umbrella that more than deserves its place in the sun. Designed by Carlo Basso, the new Daisy Umbrella has the design punch of an instant icon and promises to be a future fixture around the pools of the finest villas and hotels and earn a prime position on private beaches.

If the inspiration is clearly floral, the design is a simple, powerful abstraction, as delightful from above as in the shade below. Eight flat but delightfully curved woven 'petals' are set in an epoxy aluminium frame and come in a range of colours, from earthy greys and browns to sea blue, frangipane yellow and a popping bougainvillea purple. And given these petals are easily extractable and interchangeable, there is the creative potential to arrange your own vivid colour combinations and compositions.

While the look is absolutely contemporary, Daisy is entirely handmade by skilled professionals, from the hand-welding of the aluminium frame to the hand-weaving of the petals. And the construction and materials – from the epoxy-coating of the aluminium to the high-density polyethylene used in the petals – ensure that Daisy is more hardy perennial than shrinking violet.

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