Latest news with #ChaiseLongue
Daily Mail
24-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
'Fart zone' fears as air passengers weigh in on latest seating concepts
From bicycle-style standing seats to double-decker recliners, airplane seating concepts have been intriguing and mortifying passengers in equal measure recently. In February European manufacturer Airbus revealed it was working with a Spanish start-up, Chaise Longue, on a two-level seating system. But the idea of some passengers staring at the lower backside of fliers on raised platforms sparked controversy online, with one social media user writing: 'Last thing I want when flying is being stuck in someone's fart zone.' It comes after news this week that several budget airlines are set to introduce standing-only seat options. The bike-style padded seats allow passengers to lean at an angle without completely sitting down – and could be introduced as early as 2026. However, it's the double-decker idea - which features one row of seats on a raised platform, followed by one row at a normal level, and so on - that has caused unease among the flying public. For passengers up top, worrying about the etiquette of reclining will be a thing of the past, with no one directly behind to complain about it. Meanwhile, bottom passengers would be able to stretch their legs more and even put their legs up slightly, thanks to added space under the chair in front. The dual level concept is courtesy of Alejandro Nunez Vicente, CEO and founder of Chaise Longue, who said his firm is exploring 'early stage concepts' with Airbus. 'After 4 exciting years pursuing my dream of improving the passenger experience and giving passengers what they truly deserve, today I am very excited to make [this] announcement,' Vicente said in a LinkedIn post. 'It's the dawn of a new era for commercial aviation, so I hope that you are as excited as we are with this announcement and that soon, you can be crossing the skies in a more comfortable, spacious and two-level seat.' However, the initial images have raised fears about people passing gas in the cabin. One person on X said: 'The nice thing about this arrangement, is that farts from the higher seats in front of you will hit you right in the mouth so you don't have to wonder where they came from.' In response, Vicente said: 'With some common sense and maturity you should be able to find your answer.' He added: 'Gas in general doesn't go through solid objects like seat cushions, seat covers and plastic shells.' It's unclear when the two parties are aiming to roll the design out to aircraft; has contacted them for more information. Vicente, who studied industrial engineering at Brunel University of London, started building his first plane seat prototype by hand in 2021 using just a 'bunch of planks.' Chaise Longue has provided a digital model online of the layout, which lets web users control a Sim-like figure in a mock-up of an aircraft cabin. According to the concept – which has also piqued the interest of Emirates – passengers would decide whether they were booking top seats or bottom seats. From the promo images, it seems passengers in the bottom seats would have ample legroom – but less space behind them to recline. Conversely, the top passengers would have lots of room to stretch back but not quite as much legroom. However, considering the bottom passenger would have their head directly behind a fellow flier's backside, the top seats may prove more popular. What's more, bottom passengers would have the back of someone's chair looming high over them, which could either increase the sense of privacy, or claustrophobia. Everyone would have space under their own seat to put their baggage – but the bottom row passengers would get a little extra space in front of them too. Another said 'soon they will be packing us in with the luggage', adding: 'I will NOT fly in a double decker seating arrangement' Yet another said: 'The day this seating arrangement goes into planes is the day I start travelling only as far as I can drive' Notably, the design gets rid of the overhead luggage compartments in order to utilize the plane cabin's height as much as possible. Vicente told CNN he's not on a mission to eradicate normal airplane seating. Instead, he envisages a cabin where his concept is in the middle, flanked by two rows of traditional airplane seating, but he admitted 'there is still a long development ahead'. He also said he's thankful Airbus sees 'the true potential of two-level seating', while adding he's 'open for collaboration' with other aviation companies. Airbus confirmed the collaboration but offered scant further details about the project. An Airbus spokesperson said: 'Chaise Longue is exploring some early stage concepts with Airbus on two-level seating solutions for Airbus commercial aircraft.' 'Given the nature of this early phase level,' the spokesperson added, Airbus preferred 'not to further comment at this stage'.
Daily Mail
23-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
And you thought the standing-only seats were bizarre! Airbus is working on a DOUBLE-DECKER plane seat to give passengers more legroom - but baffled travellers dub the bottom level the 'fart zone'
The news that several budget airlines are set to introduce standing-only seat options rocked the world this week. The bike-style padded seats allow passengers to lean at an angle without completely sitting down – and could be introduced as early as 2026. However, the standing-only seats aren't the only bizarre airplane seats to hit the headlines in recent months. In February, Airbus revealed that it was working with Spanish start-up, Chaise Longue, on a double-decker plane seat. The concept features one row of seats on a raised platform, followed by one row at a normal level, and so on. For passengers up top, worrying about the etiquette of reclining will be a thing of the past, with no one directly behind to complain about it. Meanwhile, bottom passengers would be able to stretch their legs more and even put their legs up slightly, thanks to added space under the chair in front. However, the idea proved controversial among social media users, with one posting: 'Last thing I want when flying is being stuck in someone's fart zone.' The dual level concept is courtesy of Alejandro Núñez Vicente, CEO and founder of Chaise Longue, who said his firm is exploring 'early stage concepts' with Airbus. 'After 4 exciting years pursuing my dream of improving the passenger experience and giving passengers what they truly deserve, today I am very excited to make [this] announcement,' Mr Vicente said in a LinkedIn post. 'It's the dawn of a new era for commercial aviation, so I hope that you are as excited as we are with this announcement and that soon, you can be crossing the skies in a more comfortable, spacious and two-level seat.' The initial images have raised concerns among many travellers about people passing wind in the cabin. One person on X said: 'The nice thing about this arrangement, is that farts from the higher seats in front of you will hit you right in the mouth so you don't have to wonder where they came from.' In response, Mr Vicente said: 'With some common sense and maturity you should be able to find your answer.' He added: 'Gas in general doesn't go through solid objects like seat cushions, seat covers and plastic shells.' It's unclear when the two parties are aiming to roll the design out to aircraft; MailOnline has contacted them for more information. One Threads user said: 'Last thing I want when flying is being stuck in someone's fart zone' An X user said: 'The nice thing about this arrangement, is that farts from the higher seats in front of you will hit you right in the mouth so you don't have to wonder where they came from' Chaise Longue seating: Key benefits 6ft 2in seat allows you to almost 'lie down' if you're on an upper row Personal storage space under your own seat Increased storage under seat for those in bottom row Greater sense of privacy Lets airlines fit more seats in a given space Mr Vicente, who studied industrial engineering at Brunel University of London, started building his first plane seat prototype by hand in 2021 using just a 'bunch of planks'. Chaise Longue has provided a digital model online of the layout, which lets web users control a Sim-like figure in a mock-up of an aircraft cabin. According to the concept – which has also piqued the interest of Emirates – passengers would decide whether they were booking top seats or bottom seats. From the promo images, it seems passengers in the bottom seats would have ample legroom – but less space behind them to recline. Conversely, the top passengers would have lots of room to stretch back but not quite as much legroom. However, considering the bottom passenger would have their head directly behind a fellow flyer's backside, the top seats may prove more popular. What's more, bottom passengers would have the back of someone's chair looming high over them, which could either increase the sense of privacy, or claustrophobia. Everyone would have space under their own seat to put their baggage – but the bottom row passengers would get a little extra space in front of them too. Another said 'soon they will be packing us in with the luggage', adding: 'I will NOT fly in a double decker seating arrangement' Yet another said: 'The day this seating arrangement goes into planes is the day I start travelling only as far as I can drive' Notably, the design gets rid of the overhead luggage compartments in order to utilize the plane cabin's height as much as possible. Mr Vicente told CNN he's not on a mission to eradicate normal airplane seating. Instead, he envisages a cabin where his concept is in the middle, flanked by two rows of traditional airplane seating, but he admitted 'there is still a long development ahead'. He also said he's thankful Airbus sees 'the true potential of two-level seating', while adding he's 'open for collaboration' with other aviation companies. Airbus confirmed the collaboration but offered scant further details about the project. An Airbus spokesperson said: 'Chaise Longue is exploring some early stage concepts with Airbus on two-level seating solutions for Airbus commercial aircraft.' 'Given the nature of this early phase level,' the spokesperson added, Airbus preferred 'not to further comment at this stage'. No one wants to get stuck sitting in the middle seat while flying. It offers the least personal space - not to mention the fact it has no window view, limited access to the aisle and only half an armrest to use. Now, an avid flyer has revealed a genius hack to avoid the dreaded centre seat. he claimed has a secret hack that 'has a 100 percent perfect record,' which allows people to avoid the dreaded middle seat free of charge. Travel influencer Jordan Tually said the hack has a '100 per cent perfect record,' allowing people to avoid the middle seat free of charge. In a video clip, Tually demonstrates how to avoid this while booking a Ryanair flight from Bologna, Italy to Barcelona, Spain online.
Times
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Wet Leg review — Isle of Wight duo are back with guitar-chugging energy
In March Wet Leg announced 'we're so back' on Instagram. And before the release in July of a new album, Moisturizer, here they are, at the O2 Academy in Birmingham. The group, founded by Isle of Wight schoolmates Hester Chambers and Rhian Teasdale, have barely been away — touring extensively since becoming an overnight success with Chaise Longue in 2021. Yet when they do play that delightfully surreal, chant-along favourite, it already feels nostalgic — a defining track of the itchiness of the immediate post-Covid era, delivered with deadpan absurdity that, four years on, the new material pulls away from. The hits are here tonight and the appetite for them has not dimmed: the crowd, spanning starry-eyed tweens and BBC 6 Music dads, are
Perth Now
26-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
Wet Leg were unprepared for the 'overwhelming' fame Chaise Longue brought the band
Wet Leg admit the huge fame they gained following the release of their hit single 'Chaise Longue' was "overwhelming". The British indie rock band - who come from the Isle of Wight - saw their 2021 song go viral achieving millions of streams and views and ultimately earning the group the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Performance in 2023. Lead singer Rhian Teasdale admits she and her bandmates - guitarist Hester Chambers, drummer Henry Holmes, rhythm guitarist Josh Mobaraki and bassist Ellis Durand - were completely unprepared for the post-punk's song success and were naïve to how the popularity of the song and their eponymous 2022 debut album would change their lives. In an interview with KROQ-FM radio, Rhian said: "It was pretty overwhelming. We were so new to it all and so naïve that you would kind of just take one step, and then take another step ... Yeah, it was mad.' Wet Leg unveiled the first single 'Catch These Fists' from their upcoming second album 'Moisturizer' - which is released on July 11 - and the track, which is about unwanted attention from guys, was the last song to be recorded for the LP and almost didn't make the cut. Rhian said: "It was funny actually because we had so many songs written and we were kind of ready to [say], 'Shall we record them now?' And ['Catch These Fists'] just kind of slipped on in there, at the end. I think it was the last song. Her bandmate Ellis added: 'I don't really know how it happened. It just kind of birthed.' The band wrote the tracks for 'Moisturizer' in a rented house in England and they were inspired by binge watching horror films and repeat viewings of Mel Gibson's historical epic 'Braveheart'. Ellis said: "We did a lot of jamming. We rented a house in England and spent a month just jamming ideas, which was fun, really fun.' 'We watched 'Braveheart' like eight times because people kept leaving the room and missing the end.' Rhian then added: "We watched a lot of horror films. We also watched all of 'Alien'." Wet Leg head out on their UK tour in May.
The Guardian
04-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘This weird dream just keeps going!' Wet Leg on overnight success, sexual epiphanies and facing fears
Wet Leg's Rhian Teasdale looks like a pop star from a different era. She walks into a bar in east London wearing a giant, floor-length pale-pink padded coat. She has bleached eyebrows, dip-dyed hair, drawn-on freckles and jewels stuck to her nails and teeth. For a moment, Top of the Pops could be on primetime TV and a copy of Smash Hits in my bag. But then Wet Leg's story always did feel anachronistic. In 2021, they managed what indie bands don't often manage any more and became an overnight success. That June, they released their first single, Chaise Longue, a deadpan, perfectly simple and cheerfully daft megahit; they conquered the US and Japan, toured arenas and topped the album charts with their scathing, self-titled debut, scoring two Brit awards and two Grammys. They were still touring that album last summer, supporting Foo Fighters in stadiums. But eventually they found time to make a new one. Trailed by the punchy, indie-sleazy Catch These Fists, Moisturizer otherwise largely ditches their trademark death-stare sarcasm in favour of stompy but soppy love songs. Teasdale lives in London and we are meeting in person, but Hester Chambers, the band's co-founder and lead guitarist, lives on the Isle of Wight, where Wet Leg met and formed. (Having written their debut alone, this time, they co-wrote with drummer Henry Holmes, guitarist Joshua Mobaraki and bassist Ellis Durand.) Tracking Chambers down will prove a trickier task, but more on that later. Today, Teasdale is fresh from getting a tattoo. When we meet, she reveals the new vine-like shapes snaking up the sides of her stomach. 'It's the same artist that did this,' she says, showing me more of her ink. 'Which is kind of like a three-headed spider lady. She does loads of elves and mythical beings and swords and wizards.' There has always been something a bit otherworldly about Wet Leg. Their early videos were jokey but unnerving, a creepy hybrid of folklore and pop culture. They appeared at the Brits accompanied by Morris dancers. For Moisturizer's Aphex-Twin-esque artwork, a goblin-like Teasdale stares at the camera, while Chambers hides her face. Their nails are long, sharp and deadly looking. They are upping the uncanny. But in spring 2021, Wet Leg were just a hopeful guitar band, signed to Domino, with Chaise Longue in their back pocket. What did Teasdale think was going to happen next? 'We were completely naive and, in some ways, that was good,' she says. 'I just thought we were going to keep on working our regular jobs. Even if you're quite high up on a festival bill, you can't support yourself from that alone, especially in a band with five people.' What actually happened was that Wet Leg toured the world solidly for three years, playing countless festivals – Dave Grohl came out to scream with them at Coachella – and as support for Harry Styles' global arena tour after he covered their single Wet Dream on BBC Radio 1. Was there any danger of burnout? 'I did get homesick a few times,' Teasdale concedes. 'I had a couple of emergency flights, where I'd fly home for one day and my partner would cook me dinner and then I'd go again.' What did she want when she got home? 'Beans. Cheese and beans on toast.' Luxury! 'Sometimes with Marmite,' she sighs, happily. In earlier interviews, Wet Leg sometimes seemed baffled by all the attention. Their interviews could be vague and peppered with in-jokes; it rarely looked as if they were taking themselves seriously. Watching footage of them on the Grammys red carpet shows a distinct clash between the sincerity of a US reporter and two British women gamely giving it a go. Chambers mostly looks alarmed, while Teasdale describes her choice of outfit with a deadpan: 'I just wanted to get my bum out.' Being from the Isle of Wight, Teasdale says now: 'To find yourself at some weird Grammys afterparty together, it's just funny. It's extremely easy to realise how ridiculous everything is, because we've known each other from being teenagers.' It is not that they weren't taking it seriously. 'I can't really speak for the others, but I've had so many weird jobs. And whatever weird job I've had, something in me does want to try really hard.' What's the weirdest? 'I was a character at a theme park,' she says, a little reluctantly. Go on … 'I was this thing called a Squawk Bird, a puppet you have to get inside. You have to make all the sounds.' The theme park was on the Isle of Wight, where three of the band live. After a few days of trying to arrange a chat with Chambers, she asks if she can instead answer my questions by email. Chambers has anxiety. 'My initial thought was: 'Sorry, I can't, I'm too scared,'' she writes. 'These past years have been a crash course in learning about myself, and one of those [lessons] is that my social anxiety won't be therapied away.' Chambers admits that certain aspects of band life can be challenging. 'Sometimes I have no idea how I manage to get on the stage,' she writes. 'Rhian said to me, feel the fear and do it anyway. That's helped a lot. We never thought it would get this far, so it wasn't really a problem before. But now we're here.' What did getting here feel like? 'It was such a weird and unexpected journey [that] I assumed it would be over before we knew it, like a long summer holiday, just riding the wave before it spat us out. I still have that voice saying 'Don't get too comfy', but it's drowned out a little by the excitement of having made a second record and getting to play some more gigs together.' I ask Teasdale if she feels protective towards Chambers. She isn't sure. 'Yeah? But then I don't know if it's because I'm more naive than Hester. Hester is very intelligent, so I think, in our own ways, we're both protective of each other.' In early 2024, having finally finished touring, the band stayed in an Airbnb in Southwold, Suffolk, and started working on the songs that would become Moisturizer. In one not-so-serious interview in summer 2022, they claimed to have already written and finished a second album. 'That was a lie,' Teasdale says, serenely. 'Everyone was like: 'Don't you feel the pressure? Aren't you scared?' So we just said we'd done it.' But wasn't she scared? 'Of course,' she says. 'There's that noise in your head that we didn't have last time. But it's just not very helpful. And it's helped so much, having the five of us writing together, because sometimes I'd go down in the morning and be like: 'I just can't. I don't have anything to give today, nothing sounds like music.' And Ellis would just be like: 'Don't worry about it, dude.'' In a sign of how much the music industry has changed, the Airbnb was an extravagance. 'Something I've learned the hard way is that the more money you chuck at something, the worse it is creatively,' says Teasdale. 'The more money you spend on something, the less it becomes yours. That's a really freeing observation. Just having a good idea is sometimes the strongest …' She catches herself and breaks into a mocking, singsong voice. 'A good idea and a pure heart,' she jokes. 'Please don't write that.' Rather than trying to replicate the Chaise Longue formula, Wet Leg simplified everything, shooting for songs that would be fun to play live. As a result, Moisturizer has more muscle than its predecessor. There is a hint of Nine Inch Nails and Post-era Björk; most of its tracks would tear up an indie disco dancefloor. Its subject matter is also more straightforward. There are still a couple of scorching kiss-offs: Catch These Fists is about being chatted up by a sleazy guy ('I just threw up in my mouth / When he just tried to ask me out'), while Mangetout gives short shrift to a 'washed-up, irrelevant' enemy, telling him to 'get lost forever'. But the record generally steps away from caustic put-downs and radiates romance. Why? Love, of course. Teasdale met her partner at a festival in Portugal, in the thick of the madness, at the end of 2021. It was the first time Wet Leg had played outside the UK. 'We were all so excited,' she says. And then? 'It was love at first sight. Literally. It was just an energy. It was just like: oh. Ohhh! Because of course I wasn't looking for love, in any capacity, at all. But that's what they say, isn't it? It always comes when you least expect it.' Her partner is non-binary; Teasdale prefers not to reveal their identity. Until that moment, Teasdale had always assumed that she was straight. 'It's not very mysterious,' she says. 'The thing with queer love, as well, is that, if you're female-presenting, people assume you're best friends.' When Wet Leg were writing their first album, Teasdale was nursing a broken heart. During the band's ascent, the ex-boyfriend in question gave an interview to the Sunday Times about how he inspired the songs, which provoked a deserved backlash. 'It was pretty shit,' she says, quietly, conscious of widening the conversation to 'how often people – especially women – have their work or contributions overshadowed or claimed by others' in all fields, not just music. Teasdale used to be a cynic about love, she explains, and says she had never been able to write a love song before – at least one that was 'lusting over a guy. Maybe that was something in my subconscious that was just … very gay,' she laughs. 'It just feels so much more empowering to write it about a non-man.' That sense of empowerment has also expanded into their image: Teasdale says she feels far less inclined to cover up these days. How does Teasdale's love story fit in with what Chambers, who is in a long-term relationship with Mobaraki, has experienced over the past three years? 'The theme was pretty prevalent early on in Rhian's lyrics and it made me really happy to see my friend so happy and in love that she wrote about it,' Chambers says. She points out that she had never written a love song before this record, either, but has also broken that barrier, in a way. 'Don't Speak is a song I wrote as Josh, to me. Does that still count?' The record opens with CPR, a stomping melodrama about falling deep and hard; Jennifer's Body, named after the cult horror film, is a declaration of obsessive love. 'The first time I watched it, I would have been a straight teenager and was just like: 'Oh, this is a cute film,'' says Teasdale. She has since picked up on its queer subtext. 'It's so funny. I've been with my partner for three years now and I'm still having these epiphanies, literally daily.' There are odes to domesticity, too, such as the lovely, lilting Davina McCall. 'It's a really soppy love song. Me and my partner were watching Big Brother, and I know she isn't presenting the new one, but it made me think of watching Big Brother as a teenager, and how iconic she was, and that catchphrase: 'I'm coming to get you.'' It turns out that McCall was also an early fan of the band. 'When we were first starting to play shows, she tagged us in a post and she was at a show with a Wet Leg T-shirt on. We were all obviously super-stoked.' Does McCall know she has a song named after her? 'No! I feel like I need to tell her. I feel like that would be the right thing to do.' When I tell McCall, she sends an ecstatic video note about how much she loves the band and how sorry she was that a prior engagement meant she had to turn down their invitation to a secret show last week. 'Please invite me again,' she says, 'because you've made my life. Bearing in mind I'm a 57-year-old woman, I'm not their natural fan, but I think they are ace: really cool, love the lyrics, love the music, love the attitude. They're fucking amazing.' It is strange to hear Teasdale talk about what excited them all first time around: being tagged by McCall, playing in Europe for the very first time. Given how much Wet Leg exceeded their own wildest expectations, are they having to reconsider what they want from the band? 'Going with the flow is part of the ambition,' says Teasdale. 'It's not: 'What accolades do we want? What slots do we want to have?' My ambitions, personally, are to just make something that I can look back on and be like: 'Oh, that was really fun to make, I'm happy with that.'' She adopts a silly voice. 'Taking it seriously, but not taking yourself too seriously,' she says, with a grimace. 'That classic chestnut.' Having achieved world domination, they are about to find out what happens next. I ask Chambers if she is ready. 'We're heading back into the madness, ready or not,' she replies. 'This weird dream just keeps going. I'm down to clown.' Moisturizer is released on 11 July on Domino
