Vitra Cork Stool

Cork furniture is back — and for good reason: Renewable, recyclable, lightweight, inexpensive and warm, it seems to have no downside.

The versatile material has cycled in and out of fashion in furniture and interior design since its mid-century heyday, when visionary creators from Edward Wormley to Frank Lloyd Wright used it in some of their most famous work.

Today, the wheel has turned once more in cork’s favor, as designers trend toward more eco-friendly options. In addition to its aforementioned attributes and the fact that it is waterproof and highly insulating, the cork oak trees (native to Portugal and Spain) from whose bark it is made are unharmed by the harvesting.

Cork, in short, is more than just a convenient bottle stopper. As the environmental impact becomes an increasingly important consideration, furniture designers are turning to the material in droves.

Shop a wide variety of cork tables, cork seating and other cork furnishings on 1stDibs.

Stools are versatile and a necessary addition to any living room, kitchen area or elsewhere in your home. A sofa or reliable lounge chair might nab all the credit, comfort-wise, but don’t discount the roles that good antique, new and vintage stools can play.

“Stools are jewels and statements in a space, and they can also be investment pieces,” says New York City designer Amy Lau, who adds that these seats provide an excellent choice for setting an interior’s general tone. 

Stools, which are among the oldest forms of wooden furnishings, may also serve as decorative pieces, even if we’re talking about a stool that is far less sculptural than the gracefully curving molded plywood shells that make up Sōri Yanagi’s provocative Butterfly stool. 

Fawn Galli, a New York interior designer, uses her stools in the same way you would use a throw pillow. “I normally buy several styles and move them around the home where needed,” she says.

Stools are smaller pieces of seating as compared to armchairs or dining chairs and can add depth as well as functionality to a space that you’ve set aside for entertaining. For a splash of color, consider the Stool 60, a pioneering work of bentwood by Finnish architect and furniture maker Alvar Aalto. It’s manufactured by Artek and comes in a variety of colored seats and finishes.

Barstools that date back to the 1970s are now more ubiquitous in kitchens. Vintage barstools have seen renewed interest, be they a meld of chrome and leather or transparent plastic, such as the Lucite and stainless-steel counter stool variety from Indiana-born furniture designer Charles Hollis Jones, who is renowned for his acrylic works. A cluster of barstools — perhaps a set of four brushed-aluminum counter stools by Emeco or Tubby Tube stools by Faye Toogood — can encourage merriment in the kitchen. If you’ve got the room for family and friends to congregate and enjoy cocktails where the cooking is done, consider matching your stools with a tall table.

Whether you need counter stools, drafting stools or another kind, explore an extensive range of antique, new and vintage stools on 1stDibs.