Just like Hyundai's Kitchen Nano Garden and the Electrolux Outdoor Kitchen, the Canteen series of furnishings by London design firm Very Good & Proper is an auspicious harbinger of appealing eclecticism. Perhaps it's no accident that the three companies are focused on the kitchen. It took a bit of digging to discover it, but VG&P is actually an outgrowth of a fashionable if informal London eatery called Canteen.

Canteen hook & knob. Designed by Very Good and Proper.

The restaurant, founded in 2005 by designer/restaurant entrepreneur Patrick Clayton-Malone, intends in some measure to re-define and re-invent the long-maligned tradition of English food. According to Dwell, Clayton-Malone's restaurant is reflective of "a renewed national interest in supporting local farms [that] has introduced color and freshness to traditional dishes." Very Good and Proper takes the notion and applies it to design. Created by Clayton-Malone, Andr© Klauser, and Ed Carpenter, The Canteen table, table legs, utility chair, and hook & knob were made specifically to complement the look and feel of the restaurant.

Canteen hook & knob. Designed by Very Good and Proper.

Canteen table and Utility Chair. Designed by Very Good and Proper.

Utility Chair. Designed by Very Good and Proper.

Judging from the furniture, Canteen has millennial merits indeed. The four pieces are simple without being simplistic-no-frills designs reflective of a local aesthetic (and they're relatively inexpensive to boot). The table is a square top of beech ply with rounded edges; its cast-aluminum legs attach directly to the top, obviating the need for a bracing system. Just so with the many-colors of Canteen table legs, "ready to attach to any tabletop or even an old door... available in boxed sets of four in a range of snazzy colours." The utility chair is inspired by a post WWII design, adding to that concept's substantial functionality via the complementary duo of a powder coated steel frame and a pressed beech plywood seat and back. The chair is lightweight and stackable and available with or without a seat pad. Lastly, the eminently useful hook and knob employs the very same powder coated steel in addition to a large, round, easy-to-locate chrome knob-just the spot for your coat and hat.

Very Good and Proper likes to employ the carpentry catch phrase "measure twice, cut once" to characterize their brand of "considered, practical, relevant and reasonably priced products." In view of VG&P's product-testing pedigree (there's no match for the rigamarole of a functioning restaurant), I'm sold. If the Canteen series can stand up to the demands of the ravenous London throngs, certainly it’ll meet the A&D needs of the average Joe.

Via FastCompany.