CHARLES Rennie Mackintosh may have designed the world's first high back chair but Blackburn's very own furniture design prodigy has set a new bar for his peers.

Former stained glass window maker Jamie Hough came up with the sleek and stylish chairs for his final year university project.

And the designs have been such a hit that Jamie, of Whalley New Road, Blackburn, is being touted as the next big thing in the design world.

But becoming a designer was an accident. Jamie, 24, who studied at the University of Central Lancashire, said: "I worked making stained glass windows then I decided to go back to college and did a diploma in graphic design. The teacher said I was rubbish at it. We had to produce a design for a project and I put mine in a box. The teacher preferred the box I had made to the design in it and it went from there."

Jamie has already won Best in Show at University of Central Lancashire 2006 and is exhibiting at the New Designers Business Design Centre London 2006 and Degree Show University of Central Lancashire 2006.

His pair of low loungers started life as a piece of plywood which give the impression they are made from solid wood.

He compressed and moulded the plywood then veneered them - and he hasn't use a single nut, bolt and screw to support them.

Jamie said: "It is impossible to bend solid wood but I wanted it to look like solid wood. I like contemporary, simple and modern pieces."

Jamie's chairs are on exhibition at the Museum of Lancashire, Stanley Street, Preston in the New Creators exhibition which runs until January 3, 2007.