It must have been 1990 or 1991 when one fine day a bunch of furniture appeared in the patio of my family house in Utrera. Apparently, my mother had gone to buy olive oil directly from the processing factory and had returned not only with the oil, but with this pile of stuff she’d noticed haphazardly strewn about the factory premises. Among it all there were three long wood benches, their length fitting perfectly with that of our long Edwardian dinning table (the table is a whole other story). To this day, two of those benches are still in use at that table. At the factory, the benches had been used by “fabricantas”—the name given in the town to the women who worked for the local olive industry—during their rest stops or even while actually selecting, rinsing, pitting or dressing table olives.
Kauh’s “Los Olivareros” project sits on the site where that factory used to stand, and it was just a matter of time before we ended up designing some benches for the building. And those benches names just had to be “Olivia G”, “Olivia M” and “Fabricanta”. “Fabricanta” is a take on my parents’ benches. It’s just about as long, but its seat is wider and made up of multiple boards instead of just one long plank; given its hidden steel structure, it doesn’t need the wood bracings the original benches had. “Olivia G” is even longer than “Fabricanta” and it curls up to embrace space and its users. “Olivia M” would fit into the space that “Olivia G” seems to want to hold tight, while “Olivia M” imagines its users sprawling all over the place. In a couple of month’s time we shall see how this new family of benches fares.
Debía rondar 1990 o 1991 cuando un buen día un montón de muebles apareció en el patio de la casa de mi familia en Utrera. Al parecer, mi madre había ido a comprar aceite de oliva directamente a la fábrica y había vuelto no sólo con el aceite, sino con ese conjunto de chismes que había visto desperdigados por el recinto fabril. Entre todos ellos se encontraban tres largos bancos de madera cuya longitud encajaba a la perfección con la de nuestra larga mesa de comedor de estilo eduardiano (pero la mesa es otra historia). A día de hoy, dos de aquellos bancos siguen en uso alrededor de esa mesa. En la fábrica los bancos habían sido usados por las “fabricantas” —el nombre que recibían las mujeres que trabajaban en la industria aceitunera local— durante los descansos e incluso durante la selección, lavado, deshuesado o aliñado de las aceitunas de mesa.
El proyecto “Los Olivareros” de kauh se encuentra en parte del solar sobre el cual se hallaba la fábrica, y era simplemente una cuestión de tiempo acabar diseñando unos bancos para el edificio. Y sus nombres tenían que ser “Olivia G”, “Olivia M” y “Fabricanta”. “Fabricanta” está inspirado en los bancos de mis padres, tiene casi la misma longitud, aunque su asiento es más ancho y está compuesto por múltiples tablillas en vez de un solo tablón largo. Dada su estructura de acero oculta, no son necesarios los arriostramientos en madera que tienen los originales. “Olivia G” tiene una longitud incluso mayor que “Fabricanta” para poder enroscarse y abrazar el espacio y a los usuarios. “Olivia M” podría caber en el espacio que al parecer “Olivia G” quiere sujetar con fuerza, solo que “Olivia M” imagina a sus usuarios desparramados por todas partes. En un par de meses veremos cómo le va a esta nueva familia de bancos.
It must have been 1990 or 1991 when one fine day a bunch of furniture appeared in the patio of my family house in Utrera. Apparently, my mother had gone to buy olive oil directly from the processing factory and had returned not only with the oil, but with this pile of stuff she’d noticed haphazardly strewn about the factory premises. Among it all there were three long wood benches, their length fitting perfectly with that of our long Edwardian dinning table (the table is a whole other story). To this day, two of those benches are still in use at that table. At the factory, the benches had been used by “fabricantas”—the name given in the town to the women who worked for the local olive industry—during their rest stops or even while actually selecting, rinsing, pitting or dressing table olives.
Kauh’s “Los Olivareros” project sits on the site where that factory used to stand, and it was just a matter of time before we ended up designing some benches for the building. And those benches names just had to be “Olivia G”, “Olivia M” and “Fabricanta”. “Fabricanta” is a take on my parents’ benches. It’s just about as long, but its seat is wider and made up of multiple boards instead of just one long plank; given its hidden steel structure, it doesn’t need the wood bracings the original benches had. “Olivia G” is even longer than “Fabricanta” and it curls up to embrace space and its users. “Olivia M” would fit into the space that “Olivia G” seems to want to hold tight, while “Olivia M” imagines its users sprawling all over the place. In a couple of month’s time we shall see how this new family of benches fares.
