When Zach Rotholz started selling recycled-cardboard chairs on York Street last year, people thought: Interesting.Is this really a business?
A year later, not only is Rotholz in business — he has expanded his store, Charigami, to a storefront at 976 Chapel St. across from the Green.
A crowd helped him celebrate his first birthday at the new location at a party last Sunday. Disco music rippled through corrugated cardboard, free origami lessons, and a sampling of sushi.
Urban nomads of all ages turned out to celebrate — and, as usual, to check out the corrugated cardboard chairs, iPhone cases and tables.
“Can I actually sit on this?” a young woman at the party asked. She thought she was looking at an art exhibit she was assured she was in fact looking at a chair. She sat on it — and proclaimed it a better seat than a wooden one. She wasn’t the only one who checked out the work hanging on the wall and concluded she was in a museum, not a store.
Click here to read about Chairigami’s launching last year and about Rotholz’s background. Click on the play arrow on the above video to watch him describe what he’s up to.
“I’m really excited about the new location,” he said this week. “I think it will draw in a lot of people here.”
For many years the building has served as an advertising window for other companies. Now Chairigami will fill it; and a much-anticipated Shake Shack outlet is opening next door.
Much of the new buzz at Chairigami has centered around its iPhone case.
Brandi Fullwood, a James Hillhouse High School senior, is an Independent intern.