In 1984 Chris McCormack began to import high quality leisure furniture to the UK in the form of Fischer Möbel. This brand was joined seven years later by Dedon, and finally, in 2003, Ego Paris was founded in partnership with Leisure Plan joining the triumvirate being exclusively represented in the UK by Leisure Plan.
Based in Stansted Montfichet, Leisure Plan is a grand little place, very welcoming yet understated with its own working windmill dating back to 1787.
Just 40 minutes by train from London, Stansted Airport close by and minutes from the M25/M11 junction, Leisure Plan is accessible – and that’s a good thing, because designers looking to source the best in high quality, multiple award-winning leisure furniture, with a bespoke on-site cushion-making service, should take note –
Leisure Plan is the pre-eminent distributor of high quality leisure furniture and an ideal supply partner for hospitality design projects.
Leisure Plan’s warehouse is in Bishop’s Stortford, just over the county border in Hertfordshire. Typical of Chris’ keep-it-simple approach to business, this operation is well organised and smartly executed. With Leisure Plan’s warehouse, there are no middle men, just John and David, who are in charge of making sure furniture arrives as required, in the right place at the right time.
Most orders for the UK are made by dedicated delivery, using the company’s own transport. Leisure Plan then unpacks, assembles and places the furniture according to the brief and removes all unwanted packaging. For overseas deliveries, there is a reliable network of shippers which can be deployed according to location and order type.
Of the three brands it represents in the UK, it is perhaps Dedon that has become most widely known in the last five years, thanks to a tremendous and highly successful consumer branding campaign and compelling back story.
Founded by Bobby Dekeyser in Munich in 1990, the key to the business was the use and development of a special fibre from the family industrial plastics business and adapting it to create a style of outdoor furniture that was to prove revolutionary.
By 2000, Dedon had its own dedicated factory in Cebu in the Philippines producing this woven fabric with production facilities in Lüneberg near Hamburg in Germany. In line with its eco-credentials, the Dedon fabric is 100% recyclable and toxin free.
In only two decades, Dedon has become a byword for cool, chic, high quality designs – an international trendsetter in outdoor furniture. Dedon is now sold in 80 countries around the world and Leisure Plan is the exclusive UK distributor.
Ego Paris is all about the language of colour. It offers more than 300 colour and material combinations across its Premier, Tandem and Kama collections. Whether it is neutral tones of taupe or grey, or more vibrant splashes such as hot pink and tangerine, Ego Paris allows designers to create a tailor-made solution to fit any brief and bring out the very best of a given environment.
Since the company set up in 2002, Ego Paris has developed a varied, dynamic and distinctive furniture collection of tables, chairs, sofas and loungers which individually, or in combination, provide a wide range of design solutions for the hospitality market – with an unmistakable dose of French flair.
As a founder member of this young company, Leisure Plan is pleased to be associated with the development of the brand in the UK and abroad.
Fischer Möbel’s signature style can be described as featuring clean lines with subtle elegance with an assured contemporary confidence.
Since the early 1980s, the family-owned company has excelled in the use of innovative, high quality material technology, offering tough tabletops made of fm-ceramtop, fm-laminat and top grade teak, in combination with the highest quality stainless steel and aluminium, produces. These materials, along with the technical precision and attention to detail Fischer Möbel stands for, creates outstanding furniture with durability to match.
Fischer Möbel was Leisure Plan’s first partner over 40 years ago – a relationship which prospers to this day.
But for many designers, the major benefit of working with Leisure Plan must be its on-site cushion manufacturing capabilities which helps create an individual look for each and every project.
Whilst many jobs will find the manufacturers’ original palette perfectly acceptable, quite rightly some projects and some customers will require a more bespoke solution, and with Leisure Plan that is exactly what they get – high quality leisure furniture from three leading global brands, with the ability to specify the fabric colour, size and material quickly and easily. What more could be asked for?
