“I like that it’s functional yet playful. It’s nice that something as utilitarian as a coat rack can be made visually pleasing, and provide a bright spot of color in your home. We’ll most likely hang it in our child’s room when we have kids. Kids like good design too.”

We asked Tristan if he’d ever won anything:  ”I won a raffle when I was 4. The prize was a bottle of wine, which I was not allowed to keep. Kind of a bummer. This is much better.”

Lastly we interviewed Robert M., who won the Eames Splint (pictured below suspended from the ceiling at the Eames Office in Santa Monica. Ca)

“Starting off with your last question first – I do not win drawings – period. So, I am super excited to have had my name drawn. Maybe this will be a turning point. I have won auctions before, but then, that’s really just the right to pay for something which really isn’t the same thing. When I learned that I won, I excitedly called my wife and exclaimed, ‘Babe, I just won a splint!’ Needless to say she was a little baffled.

As far as the design goes, the splint has a number of physical characteristics that appeal to me and includes a second (or vice versa) layer of symbolism. Aside from the obvious that the splint represents the dawn of an iconic furniture design era and form, it also represents an outstanding design solution.

As an urban planner practicing economic development for the City of Pasadena, Ca, I am regularly presented with challenges that require a different approach towards finding a solution for multiple and often divergent agendas – this splint is of course a literal interpretation of that concept – working with a material that is typically rigid and flat and applying differing techniques to mold, bend and flex to create a form that is more curvilinear and accepting thereby resolving a number of limitations.

There are other elements that are aesthetically pleasing as having a “Found Art” appeal. I have always been drawn to art that utilizes a variety of materials and techniques that result in a somewhat dark theme involving doll parts, bits and pieces of things all interwoven and layered towards composition. However, while I can appreciate that aesthetic, I choose not to live within it (or I should say my wife states that we will not) but this allows enough to satisfy my taste, and be clean enough to meet hers.

There is also something about the original purpose of the splint that seeks to resolve or repair the affects and conditions of war on the human body and represents survival, healing, and repair from the affects and in that sense further reminds us of the damages and costs associated.

I should also note that it is a bit ironic that I am the recipient, having been known to be a little accident prone myself; I hope that I never have the cause to use it.”