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Our story… where it all began
Blå Stations started around a furniture family designed by the
founder, our father Börge Lindau. The series is called Oblado and it
was launched in 1986, the same year the company was established.
The Oblado series was innovatively intense in several ways. If we
take the chair B4, which is available in 3 different heights and
different materials, the moulded seat ring is an innovation. Earlier in
history, round rings in furniture were either done using a segmented
joining structure or made from form pressing two shaped halves that
were joined together. These techniques certainly produced visually
round shapes – but never completely round or repetitively the same.
The round seat ring of the chair B4 is made of 8 pressed halves
in birch veneer that are put together like a jigsaw puzzle and then
pressed a second time in a ring tool that always gives the same
round shape. The second innovation was more of an environmental
requirement for industry. – “We don’t want any formaldehyde in the
glue!” Börge Lindau said. At that time, in 1986, Sweden had the
highest formaldehyde content in Europe, higher than the European
approved level. Börge’s demands were taken seriously, and the
industry started experimenting, using us as guinea pigs, and after
many trials and errors, we produced an adhesive that consisted of
only one tenth of the European approved level of formaldehyde.
This glue was used for almost 3 decades in the compression
moulding industry and today our glue is completely formaldehyde
free.
We’ve been innovators and influencers from our very beginning...
