The SpoolStool makes power available when needed, but hides it underneath a tasteful European Beech veneer. Photo: Joe Levy Design student Joe Levy is a digital native busy redesigning classic products to accommodate modern technology. Photo: Joe Levy Tacky plastic takes a back seat to timeless hardwoods in this design. Photo: Joe Levy The SpoolStool enables technology, but isn't limited by it. The stool can still be used for analog sketching or simply to support a cuppa. Photo: Joe Levy The only major weakness of the design is connecting the stool's legs with power plugs. The idea is too clever by half while reducing the functionality by 75 percent. Despite the technical limitations Levy is enthusiastic about the concept. "I also enjoyed playing with the idea of mocking the extension cord's function, so this is really where the idea of having plug-in legs came from," he says. "Personally I felt plugging a stool's legs in feels really cool too!" Photo: Joe Levy The SpoolStool isn't perfect, but is a good first attempt at banishing ugly plugs and reclaiming living spaces for high design. Photo: Joe Levy

If an intrepid time traveler could show French King Louis the 14th an iPhone, he'd think they were a wizard. However, if they showed his highness a contemporary living room set he'd immediately recognize the basic forms—while likely sneering at the lack of gold leaf and silk upholstery. Smartphones, flat screens, and game consoles have transformed our rooms into spaces worthy of the Starship Enterprise, but furniture stopped evolving with the buggy whip. Joe Levy, a 20-year-old design student from New Zealand, is trying to cut through this Gordian knot of charger cords and HDMI cables with a new approach to furniture design for the age of gadgets.

His first attempt, the SpoolStool, is a multifunctional object that can be used as a seat, small desk, or with the legs removed – a large wooden power strip. "The SpoolStool design was born purely out of hatred for extension cords," says Levy. "I hate the clutter and tangled mess that they create. I enjoyed the thought of creating an aesthetically pleasing extension cord that didn't sit in the corner of a room half-hidden."

The SpoolStool achieves a level of elegance by hiding messy circuitry inside a couple inches of hardwood. Cheap plastic power plugs are hidden underneath the minimal surface of a hardwood seat. The single cable that delivers power can be wrapped up inside the seat's gently beveled rim.

The design marries old-world craftsmanship with modern challenges and incorporates some clever touches. If left on a desk, one leg can be plugged in and a power button on the foot turns it into a small lamp/nightlight.

While impressive, the SpoolStool is still very much in Beta. Levy decided to attach the legs of the stool using actual power plugs which, while conceptually interesting, leaves just a single plug available, reducing its technical utility — not to mention its structural integrity. However, Levy sees the co-evolution of furniture and technology as inevitable. "In my opinion, product categories will change and new categories will be born in tandem with new technologies."