One of the smartest new table designs out is from La Corbeille, the trestle has been redesigned by Bénédicte de Lescure so that a table can be created from just one trestle. Now normally if you attempted to pop tabletop up on just one trestle rather than two, the tabletop would just flop off, but by sticking an V that’s like open arms at each end of the trestle, it can support the whole area of  the tabletop. It carries a glass tabletop with a diameter of up to 160cm, but if  a lighter material like wood is used it could be as wide as 210cm.

Perhaps if this design were jigged a little this trestle could work either way up. Then again that’s probably how this idea started out before it was refined considering it’s load-bearing logic. I imagine that we’ll be seeing variants of this idea over the next few years, since this is such such an economic, convivial and practical solution, I’m sure that sketchbooks are already busy.

Camping should be a civilised pursuit, and this bamboo, aluminium and steel tables certainly make it so. Made by the Japanese company snow peak these table have the hallmarks of contemporary Japanese design, a respect for the nature of materials, an apparent simplicity and attention to detail. There is a definite feel of luxury to the way they fit in their bag, open easily and click into place. There should be one in the trunk of ever four wheel drive.

A few months ago I helped my father throw out a misshapen wooden garden table that had seen too much weather and too little protection. Too bulky to be moved for storage indoors it was in a hurry to rot back into the ecosystem, as if discontent with the form that humans gave it.  Had it been a metal garden table, it would allow itself a little corrosion at the edges to be polite to it’s surroundings, but it’s true to it’s nature it would hold it’s human given shape.

I instantly loved this Filaciel  folding and extending metal garden table at the “Maison et Objet” exhibition in January. It reminded me of the traditional tables in Parisian parks but, dare I say it, this one is finer. Beautifully finished in a range of powder coated matt colours, it is particularly resistant to weathering . Manufactured in Spain, there is no clumpy welding and the mechanism for extending the table is small, robust and fluid. The thin expanse of table-top stays flat as it  is rigidified by its drop-down edges. Long openings lighten it and prevent puddles forming.

This tables also has a brilliant patented gadget. It has legs, that upon pulling a small knob, simply fold away. The Filaciel table really makes me miss having a garden, so maybe for the next exhibition the Filaciel people could perhaps come up with a fold away garden for Parisians.