Profile: Dowel Jones

Known for making serious furniture and having fun doing it, Adam Lynch and Dale Hardiman of Dowel Jones have now marked a decade of dreaming up and realising playful, accessible design with their Melbourne-based business.

Dowel Jones is the brainchild of avant-garde designers Adam Lynch and Dale Hardiman. The pair met at university where they studied industrial and furniture design together. “When we graduated 10 years ago, there were no jobs in the industry, so we started our own thing,” recalls Hardiman. Back then, still fresh from studying with bright eyes, the duo had clear goals: “We wanted to produce everything in Australia, introduce colour and be attainable,” says Hardiman. Their big break came just a year after they started, when their furniture was included in Broadsheet’s pop-up dining events. “After that, we had so many enquiries from cafes and venues asking to buy our furniture; it was a big moment for us.”

Maintaining that fresh-eyed outlook has informed the company’s approach, producing furniture and objects favouring clean-lined and colourful pieces imbued with a sense of humour.

A decade on, those goals remain. Maintaining that fresh-eyed outlook has informed the company’s approach, producing furniture and objects favouring clean-lined and colourful pieces imbued with a sense of humour. And while still a fairly small team, Dowel Jones has established itself within the Australian design landscape. “We have always valued self-funded, natural and slow growth because we think this is sustainable,” reflects Hardiman. “But we have introduced some changes like making everything in-house and prioritising sustainability.” The company has always strived to design durable and timeless furniture; as Hardiman notes, “Ten years on, our Hurdle collection still sells.”

With Hardiman and Lynch at the helm, Dowel Jones is an agile team of eight multi-disciplinary designers. The co-founders play to their strengths in the business: Lynch develops while Hardiman takes a more lateral approach, working on the digital side of things. “We do everything locally, so we are often out and about, chatting with manufacturers, seeing and feeling,” adds Hardiman.

“A big thing for us is not being pretentious – we want to keep things playful and have fun,” says Hardiman.

Alongside a strong local focus and bright tones, a core tenet in Dowel Jones designs is creating furniture that is inclusive and accessible. “A big thing for us is not being pretentious – we want to keep things playful and have fun,” says Hardiman. “We want to add value, not monetary value but cultural value. We want to show that design doesn’t have to be unattainable.” This gesture extends to their direct connection to potential clients. “I also decided five years ago to take over our Instagram and reply to every direct message we get,” says Hardiman, laughing that his fingers get sore after countless hours tapping away on his phone. Despite the overworked hands, this commitment to being approachable and genuine is at the core of Dowel Jones.

At the heart of their creative practice, Lynch and Hardiman continue to be inspired through collaboration and partnership. “What is existence without collaboration?” questions Hardiman. “I always remember a quote from when I was younger: that the person you are talking to is always more interesting because you already know everything about yourself.” It’s a belief that has been carried through into the foundations of Dowel Jones.

At the heart of their creative practice, Lynch and Hardiman continue to be inspired through collaboration and partnership.

To celebrate a decade in design, the pair have marked the occasion with an exhibition at the National Wool Museum in Geelong until late November. “It took us 13 months to plan, and it’s all about getting people to participate with our furniture,” says Hardiman. The exhibition showcases 10 different collaborative projects, including Beci Orpin, Olana Janfa, Curio Practice and MoPA (Museum of Play and Art). “This one will feature a few hundred portraits of kids, kind of like a primary school tea towel,” he adds.

When asked what’s next for Dowel Jones, Hardiman jokes that they will probably need a holiday after the exhibition. The next project in the pipeline is turning a fallen centenarian tree in Geelong’s Botanic Gardens – information that fortuitously appeared in Hardiman’s inbox – into a furniture collection. It is an apt reflection of the brand’s values: forever opportunistic, sustainable and just a little bit random.

When Hardiman looks back at the last decade, he says that he and Lynch are most proud of staying true to their initial vision to produce fun and democratic designs.

When Hardiman looks back at the last decade, he says that he and Lynch are most proud of staying true to their initial vision to produce fun and democratic designs. “You don’t need to be a ginormous business to make an impact,” he says. “Adam and I always come back to the fact that we actually don’t want to be a big business. We would rather our legacy be about openness and accessibility.” A welcome distinction from other designer furniture brands, Dowel Jones sets a powerful example of how to create positive change within the broader Australian design landscape.

Monumental legacies aside, looking to the future, Lynch and Hardiman are simply excited to continue making, never losing sight of how they started – with bright eyes, a keen sense of humour and one main goal: to have fun.