Made in the shade

Design maven Marcel Wanders makes no attempt to hide his distaste for backpacks, meals cooked in foil over open flames, and lumpy sleeping bags. An elaborate spiral-bound pop-up book sent to journalists to herald the arrival of the prolific Dutch designer's latest collaboration with Puma makes this abundantly clear.

"I hate camping," Wanders writes. "But I love lounging in style. Why should design and style be limited to city living?"

Puma and Wanders are challenging the L.L. Bean domination of outdoor living as they introduce a line of products devoted exclusively to the fine art of lollygagging.

Puma's lounge accessories will be introduced at its store on Newbury Street next month. They are not alone. Several companies are offering stylish outdoor accoutrements this season.

Wanders, a designer best known for a series of elegant porcelain vases that bear the not-so-elegant name of the Airborne Snotty vases, has worked with the athletic wear company on a bicycle. But this is a first for Puma, an exercise in design devoted to those who strive to be sedentary.

"It would really boring if everything you did was extreme. Run to the extreme! Jump high! " says Antonio Bertone, the German sneaker company's director of brand management. "Who would even want to be around you if you couldn't relax for a second. Everyone needs to pull the plug and chill out occasionally."

Bertone, who creates from Puma's Boston Design Center world headquarters, worked with his friend Wanders to create the new line, which includes a $525 villa, a $275 suitcase-like cooler, and a $25 beach ball. When the two began collaborating last year, Bertone was obsessed with prefab structures and wanted to make a pop-up house. Wanders, who has designed chairs made from macramed wire and vases cast from egg-filled condoms, wanted to bring style and whimsy to the outdoors. The pop-up house proved to be too complicated, and the villa was born. The structure is weather-proof and weighted with sandbags to keep it from blowing away, but it's not intended to be used as a tent.

"I suppose if you have a bit too much to drink you can close up the sides and have a snooze," Bertone says.

These products are not being released as a vanity project. The company sees a market for the $60 bubble lounger in the image-conscious individuals who spend large amounts on swimwear or in European concert goers who shell out hundreds of dollars on tickets to music festivals.

"Not everyone wants to be in a fluorescent yellow North Face tent or some Eddie Bauer thing," Bertone says. "There's no rule that says just because you're at the beach you have to use a crap beach ball. What we're asking is 'Why not have some fun?' "