When designing a new piece of furniture, I will reach a certain point and decide that it looks good. When I reach this point in the design process, I force myself to change the design by at least 10%. It could be a slight change to the profile, the legs, the shape, it doesn't matter, as long as I make a change to what could have been the final design.
Often it is more than a 10% difference in design, and it could be a completely different piece of furniture once I am finished. And sometimes the 10% design changes won't be implemented at all, and I will revert back to the original design. But through the process of experimenting with slight changes to the piece, I can test and visualise what could be the best version of it, which may end up being the original design.
If the design is not working at all, even after variations of the 10% rule are tested, it will be put aside. From here it is either not used at all and I move on, or, more commonly, within a week, a month or a year, there will be a thought about that piece of furniture that I hadn't considered previously. I will then test the new designs on that piece and see again if it works, and this usually is a much better design. The 10% rule can be used as soon as the design is finished, or sometimes, it can be used later, as there has been time to 'marinade' on its form and what the best version of it could be.
A real life example of this was when I made a stool that was made up of 20mm thick hexagon stacks, that were joined together and staggered slightly so that it made a spiral. It was a lot of work and looked pretty good in my mind and in my sketches. This was before I had discovered my 10% design rule. Once I had made it, I wasn't happy with it. It lacked character, it was too rigid, and didn't suit my overall design ethos.
It was put aside, left to sit in my workshop. Months later I was working a landscaping job with my brother, and we were making ponds and waterfalls out of river pebbles. To create the walls of the pond, we dry stacked river pebbles, carefully choosing the right pebble for the right spot, to ensure it would stay together. During this process I thought back to my hexagon stool design. The form of the pebbles were so natural, there were no perfect lines, edges or circles. Everything was beautiful in its own unique shape, but could sit together to create something solid if done correctly. This is what I wanted to implement in my hexagon design. I then started creating odd, rounded shapes that could stack together to make the 'River Pebble Coffee Table', overlapping each stack to create a curve and precarious looking balance.
If I had listed my hexagon design for sale, I wouldn't have been happy with it. As I waited, and implemented a change to the design based on new inspiration found, I have created something unique that I am proud of and want to put out into the world. It was from this experience that I came up with the 10% rule: to design a piece of furniture, and force myself to change it by at least 10% to test and discover what is best form could look like.
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