Parasitic Factors is a series of minimalist furniture by the Amsterdam-based design practice, Sai.E Studio. Designed by the studio’s founder, Chaeeun Lee, the series includes sculptural seating and a table, embodying the studio’s approach to material and form, using design as a medium to express layered narratives drawn from nature and lived experiences. 

The series explores the theme of parasitism and reinterprets it as more than a destructive act, but rather, as a catalyst for adaptation and transformation – metaphors for how identity shifts in response to changing environments. Here, parasitism becomes a lens to consider coexistence and the ways growth often emerges through tension.

Each piece in the series is made from carved beech wood and molten aluminum, fusing organic warmth with industrial solidity. Their forms are irregular and morphed. Bulbous, warped, and interconnected like parasite and host, where one shape seems to evolve from, or rely on, the other. The result is a body of work that feels both alien and familiar, a physical expression of both adaptation and entanglement.

Handmade at the time of creation, no two Parasitic Factors pieces are exactly the same. Each carries its own subtle variations, reinforcing the series’ meditation on evolution and individuality.