That Cardboard Bed Was Supposed to Be a Utopia

A daily mix of stories about cities, city life, and our always evolving neighborhoods and skylines. [Curbed]( Friday, July 24 Put Tab A Into Slot B [That Cardboard Bed Was Supposed to Be a Utopia]( Olympic Village furniture is just the latest attempt to create a corrugated ideal. Photo: Clockwise from top left: Toomey & Co. Auctioneers, Alamy Stock Photo, Manuel Kretzer/Responsive Design Studio, Alexandra Lange Yes, you can have athletic sex in a cardboard bed. The rumor that the cursed COVID Olympics in Tokyo was promoting celibacy through flimsy furniture [has since been debunked](, but that doesn’t mean that those beds aren’t worthy of further scrutiny. It’s not their material that’s weak but the design ambition behind them. Stylish temporary architecture has been a hallmark of Olympic Games past — just look at Los Angeles in 1984, where construction scaffolding [became enchanting Pop villages]( — but these boxy furniture pieces read as designed for forgettability, not engineered to give bodies under stress the best rest. Why build another box when, since the 1960s, cardboard dreamers have demonstrated that the material can bend, curve, and roll, much like the Irish gymnast Rhys McClenaghan, [who went viral on Twitter jumping on one of said beds]( to disprove its anti-sex reputation? Why build something in white or brown when they could be red, yellow, or blue, or have [polka dots]( or Olympic rings? [Continue reading »]( Never miss a story from Curbed: [Subscribe now.]( [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( The Latest [MoMA’s ‘Automania’: Car Culture, Minus the Culture A show that doesn’t get much past the chrome and glossy paint.]( By Justin Davidson [The Nightmarish Subway Floods in China Could Be Our Future Is this what commuting under climate change will look like?]( By Willy Blackmore [We Unearthed the 28 Best Rent Deals in NYC Right Now This week, we uncovered 1,000-square-foot apartments at fairly reasonable price points, plus a quirky loft near Union Square.]( By Jenny Xie [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( [Read More From Curbed]( It happened this week — let’s talk about it. [Sign up for My Week in New York](: a new newsletter from the editors. [GET THE NEWSLETTER]( If you enjoyed reading Curbed’s daily newsletter, forward it to a friend. Or [subscribe to our Design Hunting newsletter]( for a visual diary from design editor Wendy Goodman and the [Listings Edit newsletter](, a digest of particularly worth-it apartments for rent in New York City. [logo]( [facebook logo]( [instagram logo]( [twitter logo]( [unsubscribe](param=curbed) | [privacy notice]( | [update preferences]( This email was sent to {EMAIL}. Was this email forwarded to you? [Sign up now]( to get this newsletter in your inbox. [View this email in your browser.]( You received this email because you have a subscription to New York. Reach the right online audience with us For advertising information on e-mail newsletters please contact AdOps@nymag.com Vox Media, LLC 1201 Connecticut Ave. NW, 11th Floor Washington, DC 20036 Copyright © 2021, All rights reserved