You might find Deger Cengiz’s portable seat in the shape of the head of former President George W. Bush, with a belt for lashing it to a pole, or Laurie Beckerman’s Corian loveseat rocker in which two people must sit facing each other — so seductive and sociable, it is astonishing no one has found a way to mass produce it (at $12,000, it’s too expensive to own otherwise).

Lately, Voos has been having Friday night cocktails to introduce their designers. The most recent event, on Feb. 19, was for seven designers from the Rhode Island School of Design, a few of whom had not yet graduated. They approached furniture as philosophical inquiry, their conversations beginning with, “The problem I was investigating” or variations thereof.

Environmental responsibility was a given. Friday night, among the jeans and dark purple nail polish, one could find Andrea Summerton’s environmentally correct Bella Bench side table ($800), which was made, the catalog noted, of “urea formaldehyde-free bamboo”; Jennifer Tran’s eco-resin Flow chair ($950), which resembled a sheet of plastic curved in upon itself in a welcoming arch; and Debra Folz’s 100-Percent Wax side table ($1,350).

No, it does not easily melt, Ms. Folz explained, because it is industrial wax with a melting point of 240 degrees. She likes that it is made from a material that can be reused, she said. This was also helpful when she had difficulty getting the legs right.

There were decorative objects as well, including Jeremy Leichman’s “Suits” ($300), a small tabletop sculpture of a man in a suit, slowly spinning upside down on one arm. The designer, 29, was wearing a Borsalino porkpie and a leather jacket. When the hoary ritual of business-card exchange was initiated by the reporter — who, while not literally suited up, is an admitted suit — Mr. Leichman offered a business card that appeared blank.

“I can’t read this,” the reporter said.

“It’s in Braille,” he said playfully. “I like the gag of it.”

(Oh, no. Have we reached the age where the jokes must be explained? We are Old Suits.)

Explain the work, if you will, you impudent, uh, Hat.

“He’s a Suit, a man in a suit,” Mr. Leichman said. “He’s doing the dance — the daily grind.”

Why so grim? Can’t a Suit be happy?

“One only has to look at the new patterns of greed by people who wear suits,” he said. “That’s looking at it in derogatory terms. This is a more comical way of saying what that uniform says about somebody. Of course, I guess you could say my uniform says something about me.”

What does his hat say?

“I have to be protected from the elements,” he said. “Also, I needed a hat because I got married last month.”

So many young designers, so little space: There was James Lear’s gray upholstered Fail Bench ($1,450), which resembled a Parsons table given a good thwack in the middle so that it angled down (“From a series examining how you can devise function out of failure,” Mr. Lear said). And Frank Cresencia’s Splay Bench ($1,800), a barrel-shaped wood stave bench (“It’s about how furniture interacts with its environment, the space it’s in,” Mr. Cresencia said).

There was also Hyejung Park’s Constellation hanger and seats ($400), a vertical wooden plank on which four convex padded discs hung from wooden dowels. The idea, explained Ms. Park, 27, was that guests remove a seat, hang their jackets on the now-vacant dowel and sit down. In South Korea, where Ms. Park grew up, it is normal to sit on the floor, she said, though some Westerners struggle with it.

She offered a seat to the reporter and they sat. It was not only difficult to sit on, it was also very hard. Ms. Park said this was by design, as it helps straighten the spine. Then she helped the Suit to her feet and the Suit, surely as a man on a wire, rotated off to work.