Take texture to a level beyond its smooth threads or spiny fibers by creating a surface you can seemingly touch with your eyes as well as your hand.  French designer Mattis Esnault seems to have taken an oversized piece of fabric and done anything but stretch it over the frame he chose.

Instead, his fabric was bunched and gathered, pucking into tiny shapes that together, create the full upholstered look of the Ondule chair.

Ondule chair. Designed by Mattis Esnault.

Folded Fabric Designs the Ondule Chair with a Little Help from French Designer Mattis Esnault.

Hailing from the Higher Institute of Applied Arts and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Rennes, Mattis Esnault presents the ‘Ondule Chair’ as a new addition to his collection. Appearing to be almost as wrinkled as an intelligent human brain, the chair is made using a folded, scrunched and shaped fabric that creates random configurations of lines and swirls across its entire, irregular structure.

In French, they used the word ‘ondule’ to describe the waves of the ocean (among other wave-like things in the world). I see this Ondule chair in its full digital design as a metaphor for ‘riding the wave’ of technology into a generation that uses devices to craft unique furnishings which would otherwise be difficult, one-of-a-kind, or impossible to create. “Aesthetics is a very important part in my work,” writes Esnault of his mission on the design world. “Listening to my surroundings, I like to come into resonance with materials, colors and shapes. It is also crucial for me to entertain the idea that the shape function can result.”

Esnault’s ability to take the mental picture of a material-driven design and create it with high tech equipment and 3D modeling makes the Ondule chair a masterpiece of combined engineering and aesthetics.

About the Designer: Mattis Esnault is a young, brooding French designer who was trained at both the Higher Institute of Applied Arts and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Rennes. His determination in the field is evidently that of combined industrial and furniture design with technology since he has created the Ondule chair and Multipli© multi-purpose satchel using a heavy dose of useful software.