There is a need for balance in the world of design. Technology and its tools as they relate to the built object have influenced the world, but they can easily reduce all materials to a simple plastic. For example, with the right router bit and a CNC machine, any shape can be carved out of any material. A craftsman's talent is no less important but has the drawback of often being impractical and imperfect. The Stasis Table strives to find that balance between the pure expression of concrete's inherent nature, and the technological innovation required to build it.

Mike Pond produces provocative and honest products. He is difficult to define as either a designer or a builder, as they are both intrinsic parts of his personality and practice. His years of experience working hands on has given him an appreciation and insight into materials that is difficult to find in the architectural community. Mike has practiced in several states in the United States, and in numerous impoverished areas around the world. He has worked 4 times on schools in Juarez, Mexico, in Cairo during the 2011 revolution, and spent several months in Liberia during the Ebola crisis of 2014 on emergency housing for children who were orphaned by Ebola. To name a few. Mike feels that creating products and buildings that are artistically satisfying is terrifically rewarding, but working around the world in desperate situations gives him an enormous sense of purpose, and considers it an honor and privilege to be able to do so.

Solid & Void: There are natural forces at work that dictate how things behave. The tree leans because of its proximity to sun, birds fly south and water flows. The same force that told a river to flow a certain way through the woods, also told the beaver to build the dam to impede that river. When a beaver builds a dam, the beaver isn’t in conflict with his environment, he is part of it. There should always be a harmonious undercurrent in a design that responds to and informs the environment it is in. To design as unapologetically as the beaver is to create a product that is so fitting with where it is placed, that the setting would appear incomplete without it.