The Globe and Mail

To design a chair is one of those important architect's dreams. The greats -- Mies van der Rohe, Eileen Gray, Alvar Aalto, Eero Saarinen, Frank Gehry -- put their dream into production, compressing their battles with material and form into something for us to sit on. If it was merely about designing something to hold the body off the floor, the object of desire might have been a bed or a couch. But the chair has the structural bones to keep us upright and alert. It allows us to gaze at a view or engage somebody directly in conversation. It allows us to occupy the dream of an architect. The HAB chair by Brigitte Shim and Howard Sutcliffe, principals of the celebrated Toronto practice Shim-Sutcliffe Architects, sums up a 20-year investigation into how highly refined craft and the right fabricators can breathe remarkable life into wood and steel.