Yahoo Finance Meet the Yorkshire firm behind tool free, ‘click together’ furniture design
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During lockdown, product designer Jonathan Clark noticed a gap in the market for a ‘click together’ furniture assembly system that could be adapted and reconfigured to suit specific needs in homes. The tool-free assembly, one without even an allen key, has clearly proved pain free for consumers. Since launching in 2021, fledgling brand Shelved has seen a 60% year-on-year increase.
“Our product is designed for the home, not landfill,” says Clark, creative director at Shelved. “In a society where fast fashion is prominent, I wanted to ensure our furniture system broke this mould and offered a high-quality solution that would offer fantastic value for money across a long lifetime."
North Yorkshire-based Shelved was born as a satellite brand out of parent company Rack Systems Engineering – a 30-year-old, £18m business producing metalwork for office furniture manufacturers – which was looking to diversify and expand its customer portfolio.
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“Our Shelved modular system was initially designed by myself as a commercial product,” adds Clark. “The concept was to create an adaptable, flat-packed shelving system that offers storage and space division in workspace environments.
“Starting out in office furniture, we recognised early on in the journey of the design that there were domestic, direct to consumer opportunities for the product.
“There has also been this growing demand for people to have customisation of product, not just furniture, and the ability to have a product that you can customise and make your own.”
Shelved’s nifty online tool allows consumers to build and tailor their own design before making any purchase. Clark says: “It’s about taking pain points out and making it as seamless as possible for the customer to put it together.
"The tool free frame speeds up the process no end. The disassembly plays into it as well, you can break the product down and reconfigure it without any loss of structural integrity.
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“When you compare that to flat pack furniture, it is starkly different from the likes of Ikea. These might be alright the first time but if you take it apart and put it back together you will start to weaken everything. We don’t suffer from that.”
Clark can remember drawing and sketching trainer brands and colours “endlessly” from a young age.
Studying product design at Sheffield Hallam University, he then cut his teeth as an unpaid apprentice at a design consultancy in Leeds, before taking a job at a furniture manufacturer in Keighley where he later became senior product designer.
Rack Systems were also a supplier and when the firm went into administration, Clark made the transition across before conceiving Shelved’s e-commerce brand. Those first forays into tracing trainers still hold true today for Clark.
“Brand building, taking the nuances of what the brand is and taking that through in everything we do at Shelved just works for me,” he says.
"We make everything here in North Yorkshire and everything is UK sourced and that is something very close to our hearts.
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“The more time you spend in a place the nicer you want it to be. As a nation we are design conscience. In terms of manufacturing and quality we are still world renowned for that. It paints a very strong picture.
“Space saving allows people to maximise footprints of homes. How people live in their homes has changed over 20 years. As homes become more expensive and people are squeezed into city living, it’s becoming more of a requirement."
Clark notes that consumers tend to design their furniture around central objects or collections, while they have also found success in TV and room divider units.
“It’s very much a niche and we are aware of that,” admits Clark. “I’m very mindful of not forcing growth of the brand by bolting on additional products that don’t fit with the brand. I don’t think we will be looking to become a one-stop shop for furniture by any stretch.
“When customers send proud images of their design it’s often the objects that they are centering that capture the imagination and attention — and our shelving gives them a great opportunity to showcase that.”
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