Take A Seat With Chim Chim
September 2020
Five new public benches, specially designed by young architects and designers from the UK, Denmark, Belgium and Italy to celebrate the London Festival of Architecture (LFA), have been unveiled across the Cheapside district of the City of London.
The new City Benches are the result of a competition organised by the LFA in partnership with Cheapside Business Alliance and the City of London Corporation.
West Yorkshire based W T Knowles & Sons Ltd were happy to work with Profferlo Architecture in their bench design ‘Chim Chim’.
Based in London, Profferlo focus on the design of public spaces, exhibitions and pavilions.
Marta Marotta and Fabio Cappello (pictured) come from a Mediterranean background and were inspired by the strings of various Chimney Pots stacked on London’s rooftops: Cannon-Headed, Crown-Shaped and Square-Based, with unique brick decor, in groups of 4, 8 and 12.
Profferlo wanted to celebrate London by taking one of its most distinctive symbols and to incorporate it in a different context, designing them into a public seating area.
The ‘Chim Chim’ public bench, painted in stunning red now adorns a public space in the Bow Churchyard area of the city, inviting passers-by to sit, relax and to interact with the local environment.
The bench situated opposite Bow Bells House on Cheapside is adjacent to St Mary-le-Bow Church, famous as the church that defines London’s Cockneys.
The bench uses four different chimney pots as a backrest, each one evoking a different style of construction, all 4 provided by W T Knowles & Sons, which remains the only independent clay chimney pot manufacturer in the UK.
The Chimney Pots used in the design were, from left to right, Square Panelled Pot. Rook Pot, Square Spiked Pot and a Double Beaded Contemporary Pot.
For more information, contact W T Knowles on 01422 372833 or visit our website at www.wtknowles.co.uk.
(Photos’ used with kind permission of and thanks to Marta Marotta and Luke O’Donovan).
