“The Canariensis was born from the experience acquired during the development of the auditorium version of the Varius. Everything we learnt with the Varius about the acoustics of seating for concert halls was applied in this new series.

The Canariensis owes its name to the fact that it was specially conceived for the Alfredo Kraus Auditorium in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. Given the design of this concert hall—with stepped terraces and areas of seating oriented in different directions—we did not want each seat to be individually noticeable, rather that each row of seating should be understood as a whole. For this reason the Canariensis has a completely horizontal backrest, and the back of each seat practically touches its neighbours in such a way that the overall impression is of a continuous bench. To achieve a coherent shape, the arms are completely horizontal and the side supports are completely vertical; this makes the seating as a whole geometrically very simple, and therefore highly suited to places where the seating should be inconspicuous.

Given that there is an unquestionable collective tendency to associate wood with good acoustics—and that a wooden laminate is a very suitable material, warm, which we are particularly fond of, we used it for the structure of the backrests, leaving it exposed at the back.”

Oscar Tusquets