Furniture future

The Design Utopia exhibition shows chairs as more popular objects of design than other furniture items. Apart from Chair No. 14, there are several other signature chairs that have made their mark in the history of modern design. These include the Red and Blue Chair and the Zig-Zag Chair by Dutch designer Gerrit Rietveld, the Willow Chair by Scottish artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the bright multicolored Proust Armchair by Italian designer Alessandro Mendini.

Tian Ni, a graduate of the Academy of Arts and Design, says she is enthralled to see so many iconic designs at the exhibition, which she only saw in books at school.

She says those who frequent furniture stores may find many of these designs familiar. When these furniture pieces were invented decades or even a century ago, they were considered avant-garde.

"They challenged people's conceptions of what an article of furniture should look like and what it should be made of," Tian says.