Tom Dixon is working with students and companies to develop a product with an "ecosystem of apps" for IKEA, the British designer has revealed.
Dixon's collaboration with IKEA was described as "top secret" when it was first announced during the Swedish brand's Democratic Design Day in June.
But speaking at a press conference previewing the 56th edition of Milan's Salone del Mobile yesterday, Dixon elaborated on the collaboration, saying he was building a high-quality base component that could be adapted through plug-ins from a bed into a sofa or other item of furniture.
"Rather than a bed that you buy for a short period of time, it's a sort of platform for living that can evolve into a sofa or into a workstation, according to plug-ins that you put on top," Dixon said. "Very much like the iPhone, I'm hoping to encourage a whole ecosystem of apps that you stick on top of this basic platform of the bed."
Tom Dixon first announced the "top secret" collaboration at IKEA's Democratic Design Day in June
To build this ecosystem of add-ons, Dixon has partnered with three design schools ? including the Royal College of Art and Parsons School of Design ? as well as other companies.
"We've got a project with three universities ? the Royal College, Parsons in New York and Japan ? so there's 75 very fine minds working on it right now with actually much more superior ideas to the ones I came up with in the first place," he s...