UC171
steel hot forging scale and cracked ash slab
100x60x70 cm
Year built
2026
Function
Aux Table
Status
Available
UC171 is a sculptural coffee table born from a material I had known long before I began working with it as a designer.
Steel forging scale forms when a billet leaves an induction furnace at nearly 1,300°C and meets the air. Its surface becomes scaly, and as the steel is pressed under the forging hammers, the scale breaks away and falls to the floor. In a hot forging plant, it is the equivalent of sawdust in a carpenter’s workshop: an inevitable by-product of the process. Yet, unlike most steel scrap, it cannot be remelted to make new steel. Its journey usually ends on the factory floor.
I spent ten years as an executive engineer in a hot forging company supplying components to the automotive industry. Perhaps the idea of giving this curious material a second life had been waiting patiently in the back of my mind. Years later, still in touch with the people at the forge, I asked them to send me a crate full of it. UC171 became the first gallery-scale piece to emerge from experiments I had previously explored in smaller formats.
The base is carved from wood and coated with the forging scale, preserving its distinctive, rough, scaly texture. Its asymmetrical, organic silhouette follows the language of my drawings, with firmly grounded feet and a solid, almost elemental presence. Against this weight, the ash top appears remarkably thin, extending to the very edge of the base.
The top comes from a single slab of ash originally reserved for another project. Too cracked for its intended purpose, it found a place in this one. We filled the crack with steel powder, another gift from the forge, bringing the two materials together in an unexpected detail.
UC171 gives a new purpose to a material I had known for years. Forging scale, a by-product of hot forging, becomes the defining feature of the table, paired with a single slab of ash that had been set aside for another project. Both materials find their place in a piece that brings together my previous industrial life and my current design practice.
