A tall seat needs somewhere for the feet
Raise a dining chair to counter height and an ordinary problem appears: the floor becomes too far away. Bombo makes foot support a visible part of the stool. The seat sits above a central column, with a metal footrest below and a broad base at floor level.2
The result has a different presence from four long chair legs. Its structure is concentrated at the centre. Space opens around the pedestal, while the seat becomes the most expressive part of the outline.
That contrast explains much of Bombo’s character. The rounded body and narrow support look unlike one another because they are doing unlike jobs.
Plastic above, steel below
Magis credits Stefano Giovannoni and lists injection-moulded ABS for the seat of the reviewed adjustable version. Steel supplies the base, column and foot-support elements; the height adjustment uses a gas piston.12
The material split is useful to see. The moulded seat can take a continuous, scooped form around the sitter, while the metal below handles the concentrated support and moving mechanism. The shiny pedestal is therefore more than an applied decorative accent.
A counter or kitchen island gives this arrangement a natural setting. The stool occupies a pause between standing and settling into a dining chair. The person can face the worktop, turn towards a conversation and make use of the footrest without needing a large upholstered back.
The late-1990s moment
Bombo belongs to Magis’s late-1990s work, although the manufacturer’s sheet is not perfectly consistent about the year: its heading uses 1997/2014, while the accompanying account mentions 1996. A precise launch story would need further evidence to reconcile those labels.2
The broader design is easier to read than that dating problem. It combines the vocabulary of a sculpted plastic shell with an openly mechanical pedestal. Both halves remain visible rather than being concealed inside upholstery or a wooden case.
One name, more than one stool
A Bombo listing may describe a fixed-height stool, an adjustable version or a particular finish. The familiar seat shape does not make the bases and mechanisms identical. The useful description is the one that names the actual configuration.1
For the history reader, the detail to remember is the footrest. It turns a high sculpted seat into an object organised around a whole seated person. The stool’s appeal is not confined to its silhouette: it lies in the relationship between the surface above, the support below and the distance from the floor.