Tangerine Dream Synthesiser Playground designed and made by Dual Works for Dauvit Alexander - Photographer Hayley Salter — Photography by Hayley Salter

Tangerine Dream was designed in response to a wonderful design brief to create a synthesiser playground to house an array of experimental electronic sound equipment including an extensive synthesiser collection.

Our design nods to the 1960’s Moog synthesiser and for those that know your electronic music the name pays homage to ‘Tangerine Dream’ a pioneering German electronic music band founded in 1967 by Edgar Froese.

We were challenged to make use of a pre existing piece of vintage furniture comprising of an old School cabinet. This was repurpose by dividing it up and then juxtaposing a new element in between. This creates an eclectic mix of materials with contrasting visual qualities which complement and integrate with the existing interior, derived from old school libraries.

This playful addition features a sliding and flip up shelves, dual function synth slopes that double up as display shelves, extra storage hidden within the matching stool, lead sorter and a duo of functional pegboards for hanging cables.

The playground has been crafted from a combination of Valchromat and birch plywood utilising digital and hand fabrication techniques. The warmth and vibrancy of the orange Valcromat helps to blend the visual qualities of the dark toned vintage cabinet and the characteristics of the birch plywood.

We asked Dauvit Alexander for his thoughts about working together on this project:

Working with Dual Works is always a pleasure. They have the rare ability to talk through a vague idea and make it concrete by spotting unique (often oblique) angles and running with those in dialogue with me.
They have completed a number of projects in my house, from a jeweller's bench, wardrobes made from old house doors, an office-library based on 1960s municipal libraries and, most recently, a music workstation using an old school cabinet which I've had for years.
In every case, the resultant work has exceeded my expectations in terms of the quality of the craft, the materials and the function of the units.