Italian architect and designer Massimiliano Malagò has unveiled Copia New Yorkea, an innovative chair that transforms the structural principles of coreless exoskeleton skyscrapers into functional furniture. The unique piece combines brass, velvet, 3D-printed PLA joints, and gold thread, positioning itself as both a functional object and a critical examination of architectural design philosophy.
The chair employs what Malagò calls an "isomorphic process," which maps the spatial and structural characteristics of high-rise architecture onto a domestic seating object. The design features a modular brass grid frame that recalls the column-free curtain walls commonly found in corporate towers. Within this metal framework, a suspended fabric cocoon creates the actual seating surface, while modular 3D-printed nodes connect the frame components, reflecting the parametric connectors typical of modern high-rise engineering systems.
Unlike traditional biomimicry approaches where natural forms inspire architectural designs, Copia New Yorkea reverses this process by drawing directly from existing architectural typologies. By adapting the monumentality and structural logic of skyscrapers to the intimate scale of the human body, the work raises important questions about how design languages transfer across different scales and contexts.
Malagò deliberately connects his chair's enclosed form to historical precedents, particularly the sedan chair once used to transport elite individuals in past centuries. The designer draws parallels between these vessels of privilege and modern skyscrapers, noting that both serve to elevate, conceal, and project authority. "Their reflectivity and transparency are curated, not democratic. Nor is any of the scale of them proportional to the merits of those who inhabit them," Malagò observes.
Through this lens, Copia New Yorkea reframes the curtain wall not merely as an aesthetic choice, but as a social and political skin. The brass grid and textile cocoon become both structural and symbolic elements, positioning the chair as a reflection on architectural surfaces and their broader social implications. The combination of materials - brass, velvet, PLA joints, and gold thread - defines the chair's distinctive material palette while reinforcing these conceptual themes.
The project traces its intellectual origins to Malagò's professional experience at OMA in New York, where questions about the narrative strategies used to justify skyscraper design sparked deeper reflection on isomorphic design methodologies. Later, during his tenure at Bond NY, he experimented with translating written texts into architectural forms, a method that continues to inform his current practice and design philosophy.
Copia New Yorkea represents the continuation of this trajectory, positioning isomorphic design not as merely a stylistic exercise but as a form of architectural critique examining how references are deployed in contemporary design. Through this translation of high-rise engineering principles into a furniture object, Malagò opens an important dialogue about the role of analogy in design, the politics embedded in architectural forms, and the legitimacy of transscalar methodologies in contemporary design practice.
