Better Find Your Balance in This Two-Legged Chair
Sitting all day is killing us slowly, but standing all day isn’t a commitment most people are willing to make. Could this two-legged chair be a happy balance between the two extremes? French designer Benoit Malta came up with a middle ground that isn’t as unhealthy as sitting all day, but is more comfortable than standing for many hours at a time.
The Inactivité chair has just two legs, arms and a seat. As the user sits in it, he or she is forced to actively engage the core and leg muscles to stay balanced and avoid toppling over. The concept is similar to sitting on a balance ball to work. When you sit on it, you are constantly engaging muscles but not to the point that you feel fatigued. Your feet don’t get sore and you can shift your position as needed.
The designer calls the theory behind Inactivité “bearable discomfort.” It might also be necessary (and even welcome) discomfort for all of the office workers forced to sit still for long stretches of time every day
If this actually sounds good to you – and really, more of us should be concerned with engaging our core muscles every day – there are lots of similar options to be found. Check out a funny-looking mushroom-shaped stool that keeps you on your toes, the Buoy chair that encourages you to wobble and tilt and the Rodeo, a circular seat made of flexible plywood that encourages active sitting to strengthen the spine.
More from Benoit Malta
“Inactivity seems to be the disease of today. Our ways of living have evolved, and our bodies are less and less active. Our living spaces are conceived with the idea of comfort. My aim was to introduce a ‘bearable discomfort’ for our wellbeing – discomfort used to put the body in motion and thus out of its chronic stationary postures. The chair proposes another way to sit…it allows you to use the body as a component.”