Kenneth Cobonpue, the Cebu-based furniture exporter who designed the unique chairs where the most powerful leaders in the Asia-Pacific region sat for a Manila dinner in November, is selling six pieces of the so-called Yoda chairs to raise fund for children.
“These six chairs are the original ones sat on by the Apec [Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation] leaders,” Cobonpue says in an interview at his posh showroom at The Residences in Makati City.
He says to get the best price possible, the limited edition chairs will be sold in an auction on Dec. 16, with a starting bid of P75,000 for each chair.
“When I was selling these chairs, everybody wanted the one sat on by [US President Barack] Obama. That’s when I got the idea that it is better that I put this up for auction for the children,” he says.
Cobonpue teamed up with the United Nation’s Children’s Fund to auction off the chairs used Obama, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Philippine President Benigno Aquino III.
Asked why he chose the six chairs, Cobonpue says: “They are the ones that are auction worthy.” Proceeds from the auction will benefit Unicef’s 1,000 days campaign.
“The one with Obama would probably fetch the highest bid,” says Cobonpue.
Cobonpue says true to its name, the chairs were named after the Jedi character in Star Wars movies. “The original design of that was inspired by grass and it is called Yoda after the Jedi,” says Cobonpue, whose mother is also a designer.
Cobunpue says he took inspiration from blades of grass to design the Yoda chairs, which are made of high-quality rattan reeds. The special edition of the Yoda chair for Apec is wider and taller. It also has armrests and a swivel mechanism that enables one to turn effortlessly in both directions.
“I come from Cebu, I live in Cebu. All natural materials are from Cebu. Our main market is the export market. We opened the [Makati] showroom two years ago. Before I opened this, most people were going to Cebu,” says Cobunpue, who made a name for himself after several Hollywood celebrities bought his furniture.
Cobunpue says while his pieces are admired for their designs, they remain a part of a business. “It is business. Art is just one piece, but this is for mass production,” he says.
Cobunpue, however, says the Apec chairs will not be reproduced to maintain the exclusivity of the design.
Unicef country representative Lotta Sylwander, a Swedish national who is married to a Filipino, says proceeds from the auction will be donated to Unicef, specially to promote the 1,000 days campaign.
“These chairs were used in the Apec meeting, with six presidents sitting in these chairs.
They are unique not only in terms of designs, but the fact that presidents sat in these chairs. They have a plaque on each side, to know who sat in these chairs,” Sylwander says.
“We also want to use this opportunity to talk about the first 1,000 days of child’s life and how important that is and how that really gives a base for the rest of the child’s life,” she says.
“If the child is malnourished during the first 1,000 days, the child can never catch up. It is a damage which is permanent. They will be forever behind in development. We are talking about one third of the Filipino children. This is a serious business. We think that the loss to the national economy in terms of GDP is P3.5 billion [annually]. If we look at the loss caused by typhoon Yolanda, it is roughly the same,” she says.
Sylwander says the Philippines is one of the ten countries in the world with this kind of malnutrition rate. “There is no reason why it should happen in the Philippines. It is a combination of poverty, but it is also very much related to information and knowledge,” she says.
Sylwander says the best way to promote the health of the child in the first 1,000 days is through breastfeeding. “We inform health personnel to make sure that all children are actually breastfed straight after birth,” she says.
She says proceeds from the Yoda chairs auction will be used specifically for the 1,000-day campaign. “We will focus on hotspots in the Philippines with high malnutrition rate like Mindanao, Bicol, Samar and Leyte. We need to do a national breastfeeding campaign,” she says.
The auction is organized by Unicef special advocate for children Daphne Oseña-Paez.
“Giving children the best start in life is one cause that I staunchly advocate for. Having such historic design pieces contribute to that cause embodies the perfect marriage of creativity and social consciousness that Auction for Action was founded upon,” says Paez.
This is the fourth installment of Unicef’s Auction for Action, which was initiated in 2011, with the first three auctions raising P8.2 million for children’s programs.