Childrens chair, Wobble, Kore Design, designed and manufactured in the USA, 2020-21

Rocking stool designed for a child of around 10-11 years old. The basic form resembles a double-ended mushroom assembled from three pieces - a seat, a support and a base. It is made from purple high-density polyethylene. The base is rounded to allow the stool to rock and move with the user. The seat and base are textured.

The Wobble Chair was originally developed for a project undertaken by Jon Elmaleh whilst he was a student at the Rhode Island School of Design in the 1970s. Elmaleh received a patent for the design in 1986, then founded his studio, Out There Technologies, in 1994. The first production version, the Unistool, was sold via the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) shop from 1999-2002.

At this point, Jon Elmaleh still personally hand-turned the wooden bases of each stool, a situation that could not be sustained in the face of demand for the product. The Flexistool, a version of the stool developed for mass-manufacture, was launched in 2005, aimed at office-workers. Its success led to more and cheaper versions of the stool, as well as an expanded range of Kore items, including desks, balance boards and school seating. All Kore products are manufactured in the USA and, at the time of writing, more than one million have been sold to over 1,000 schools, businesses and institutions across the country.

The concept for the Wobble Chair consists of two simple ideas. The first is that the stable rocking motion enabled by the base encourages a person to be active whilst seated, for exercise and posture, but also to improve blood flow and concentration. The second is to increase children’s attention to tasks by allowing them to move around whilst seated in a classroom, burning off energy and reducing stress. Linked to this, active seating has been found to have concentration-improving benefits for children with conditions such as ADD and ADHD. Kore chairs are also hygienic. As well as being wipe-clean, they are manufactured using an antimicrobial product added to the plastic, which claims to reduce up to 99.9% of common bacteria.

The Wobble Chair has received a number of awards and endorsements including the ErgoExpress Attendees Choice Award (2019), Global Educator Institute Seal of Endorsement, Family Choice Award (2014), and Academics’ Choice MindSpring Award.

The basic concept of active sitting is that seated tasks can be made easier to perform by furniture that enables flexibility and movement. The simple design of the Wobble Chair, a circular seat mounted by a stalk on a heavy, curved base, successfully demonstrates this concept.

With children, active seating may improve attention to tasks and reduce stress in the classroom by allowing them to burn off energy. Active seating has also been found to have concentration-improving benefits for children with conditions such as ADD and ADHD.

B.3-2022