I'm loving the design of the Mastro Table, created for Italian manufacturer DeCastelli by Viareggio-based Gumdesign. It's not just the clean look—it's the perfect, elegant simplicity of proper materials exploitation.

Take a sheet of iron and it's pretty strong. Bend the edges twice and it's even stronger, gaining I-beam-like rigidity. And now that you've bent those edges, a channel is created--the perfect place to slot a crossbeam for trestle legs.

Make the trestle leg assembly thick enough, and it will fill the channel sufficiently enough to preclude racking. Take the leg assembly out and slide it back in sideways, and now the entire table is broken down flat for storage or shipping.

This is one of those pieces whose simple appearance belies the amount of thought that went into it. The wood joints are even fingered to increase the gluing surface area.

And they also make an accompanying bench of the same design, if different proportions.