Foster’s Favourite

Having been traditionally seen as a low quality timber, abundant and inexpensive, American tulipwood also has a unique variation in colour. It was this that attracted the legendary Norman Foster to commission Norie Matusmoto to design a set of pencil sharpeners from tulipwood. “Of all the samples we examined,” Foster says, “it was uniquely pale and the grain had an almost marble-like quality.”

The cube, cylinder and sphere sharpeners were shown recently as part of The Wish List collaboration between Benchmark and AHEC at the London Design Festival.