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Appoggio chair by Claudio Salocchi - Italy1971
appoggio_chair.html
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Armchair 406 by Alvar Aalto
armchair_by_aalto.html
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Armchair 12 by Poul Kjaerholm
armchair_12_kjaerholm.html
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Armchair 19 by Vico Magistretti
armchair_19_by_magistretti.html
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Barcelona chair by Mies van der Rohe
barcelona_chair.html
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Basculant by Le Corbusier
basculant_by_le_corbusier.html
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Batting Joe - Lomazzi, D'Urbino and De Pas
Italy, 1970
baseball_glove_chair.html
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Chair 932 by Mario Bellini
Italy, 1967
bellini_modern_chair.html
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Bentwood armchair by Michael Thonet
Austria, 1870
bentwood_modern_design_armchair.html
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Cesca by Marcel Breuer
Germany, 1928
cesca_modern_cantilever_chair.html
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Dondolo Chair by Cesare Leonardi and Franca Stagi
Italy, 1967
dondolo_chair.html
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Drum by Guiseppe Raimondi
Italy, 1969
drum_chair.html
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Eames Modern Aluminum Dining Chairs
eames_aluminum_dining_chairs.html
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Eames dinning chairs images and description
eames_dinning_chairs.html
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LCM chair by Charles Eames
U.S.A., 1946
eames_lcm_chair.html
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Lounge chair 670 by Charles Eames
U.S.A., 1956
eames_lounge_chair.html
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Eames Plywood Chair
eames_plywood_chair.html
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Sofa by George Nelson
U.S.A., 1963
I am including this, a sofa, in a book of chairs, because I consider it the only
sofa to rank with the chairs selected for this book, as a classic design. As it
happens, it is, to date, the only sofa chosen by the Museum of Modern Art in
New York for its contemporary design collections. The sofa has chromium-
plated steel tube legs, and cushions lying on rubber membranes within a round- cornered rectangular framing loop also in tubular steel. There are many aspects of Nelson's design that are especially ingenious. For example, the use of epoxy resin for the final assembly of the frame components. This enables welded elements like the connector between the front and back legs, or the T -shaped sections connecting the main loop with its ends, to be mass-produced. The epoxy connection is used to put together elements making up sofas of various lengths, as required. The method of supporting the cushions, consisting of a series of neoprene rubber platforms stretched between the front and back
cross bars, is very simple and highly effective. The cushions themselves are
leather-covered dacron and foam with a single welt around the edges. The
leather is pre-formed into a curve at the corners, which gives a soft, rounded
shape.
The effect of all this careful detailing, combined with a strong original design
idea, is a sofa that for once does not look like an extended version of a chair,
nor a vast and unwieldy piece of upholstery. It is a very taut design, embodying
the best of new design principles, but still looking invitingly comfortable, mainly
because of the soft shape of the cushions.
george_nelson_modern_sofa.html
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Landi Stacking Chairs by Hans Coray
Switzerland,1938
landi_chair_by_hans_coray.html
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Chaise longue by Le Corbusier
France, 1928
le_corbusier_chaise_lounge.html
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Le Corbusier Grand Confort Chair
le_corbusier_grand_confort_chair.html
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Vintage modern lounge chair by Pierre Paulin
lounge_chair_by_paulin.html
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Marilyn Monroe midcentury modern lips chair
marilyn_monroe_lips_chair.html
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Brno chair by Mies van der Rohe
Germany, 1930
mies_van_der_rohe_brno_chair.html
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Mies van der Rohe MR chair
Germany, 1926
mies_van_der_rohe_mr_chair.html
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Mies van der Rohe - Tugendhat chair
Germany, 1929
This chair was designed, like the Brno (p. 70), for the Tugendhat House. It
uses a seat/back construction closely similar to the Barcelona (p. 63), the flat, rectangular cushions lie on leather straps looped over a solid section steel frame. The support element is a cantilever, and the complete frame is a clear
expression of its function at every point. In contrast, the Barcelona frame is
structurally ambiguous; the steel is used to create a prestigious and elegant
design, whose roots are in aesthetic, rather th~n functional considerations.
As in both the Barcelona and the Brno, a flat steel strip is used for the frame
of the Tugendhat. The flat metal has an appearance of malleability in its bent
state, that is absent from the more stark and definitive statement of the curves
in theM R, for instance, where tube is used.
The Tugendhat has a similar sled-like look of sturdy streamlining as Poul
Kjaerholms Chair 20 (p. 144), but the flat floor bar effectively finalizes the
balance of the design. Also the Tugendhat's S shaped double-curved supports
emphasize the difference in proportion between the light cantilever element
and the upholstery. This is in contrast with Kjaerholm's design, where a fine
seat element appears poised on a broad, strong frame.
mies_van_der_rohe_tugendhat_chair.html
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Panton Stacking Plastic Modern Chair
panton_stacking_plastic_modern_chair.html
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PastiIIi or Gyro chair by Eero Aarnio
Finland, 1968
pastiiii_or_gyro_chair_by_eero_aarnio.html
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Hand Chair by Pedro Freideberg
Mexico, 1963
pedro_freideberg_hand_chair.html
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Plia Stacking Chairs by Giam Carlo Piretti
Italy, 1969
What used to be a humble folding wooden chair, has been transformed into a
highly complex technological tour de force of gem-like visual simplicity. All
the previously scattered mechanics have been concentrated in a single cast
aluminium hub which also appears in an armchair and a desk by the same
designer.
When folded, the chair is one inch thick except for the hub. The cast plastic
seat and back elements come in opaque or translucent colours, white and plain. The frame is formed from an oval section tube which is chromed or plasticized in white.
This is not. the original folding chair but it may be the final refinement of the
whole idea.
piretti_pila_stacking_chairs.html
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Chair 20 by Poul Kjaerholm
Denmark, 1968
poul_kjaerholm_-_chair_20.html
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The Berlin chair by Gerrit Rietveld
Holland, 1923
rietveld_berlin_chair.html
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Gerrit Rietveld - Zig-zag chair
Holland, 1934
The Zig-zag chair is a stark assertion of function - a platform and support for
the seated human frame. The reduction of the structure to four unobstructed
and unadorned planes has engendered a whole range of new thoughts and
possibilities, taken up by later designers, for the distribution of load-bearing
members and the absorbtion of stress. The formal quality of the object itself has
also been profoundly influential. To design a chair after coming in contact with
the Zig-zag, one is in a way forced to start from a new point of departure, with
a new initial premise, and to consider each line, plane, support or elaboration
of chair structure using much more stringent criteria.
Rietveld's intention was to make a one-piece chair, but he was defeated by
the material. Verner Panton's stacking chair has been compared to the Zig-zag, and it is clear that it embodied Rietveld's intention, though in a rather more relaxed form. Rietveld also intended the chair to use a minimum of room space. Though it is very arresting in isolation, the chair mixes surprisingly well with other furnishings. The Zig-zag is a small chair, and it appears poised, almost as if alert to its task, and ready to receive one's weight. I know a Zig-zag owner who willingly demonstrates the chair's strength by standing on the back edge, and though he may wobble, the chair will not shift. Although the construction is of extreme simplicity, the wood itself needs very specialized treatment. It is important that the beech wood be well seasoned, or the chair will be distorted quickly by warping: and this is especially ruinous if the foot becomes curved.
In making this chair of hardwood, only dovetail joints are necessary, but in softwood these must be reinforced with a batten and bolts. The chair has a small hand-hold slot cut out of the back - a pleasing detail in such a stark design.
rietveld_zig-zag_chair.html
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GF 40/4 stacking chair by David Rowland
U.S.A., 1964
rowland_stacking_chair.html
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Sling chair by Clement Meadmore
U.S.A., 1963
sling_chair_by_clement_meadmore.html
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Soriana chair by Afra and Tobia Scarpa
Italy, 1970
The Scarpa's have here produced something close to the ultimate alternative to
traditional upholstery. Upholstered chairs used to be made by skilled craftsmen,
working with layers of padding on a timber frame. The chair has a minimal
wooden base, supporting the polyurethane foam of which the chair is made.
This foam is topped with a layer of soft dacron fibrefill, and a loose-fitting fabric
or leather cover, shaped with a minimum of tailoring. The chair is given its
final form by two chromium-plated steel wire clips. This simple but revolutionary system has been used to create a whole series of pieces, including an elongated chair, ottoman sofas and armchairs. Perhaps one has to have a certain taste for plumpness to like this chair, but it is hard to deny that it has a sensuous softness and disarming honesty of construction.
Front and back views of the Soriana chair, showing the way in which the steel wire clips holds the substance of the chair in shape.
soriana_chair.html
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Steltman Chair by Gerrit Rietveld
Holland, 1964
A recently discovered Rietveld design of unknown date, this is quite a different
concept from his Red-Blue and Berlin chairs with their delineation of lines and
planes in space. Here a series of 2" x 4" elements are butted together to form a
series of L shapes which are then assembled in the familiar by-passing relation-
ship used in the other chairs. Like the Zig-zag chair it has the appearance of
being smaller than it is despite its bulky construction.
The Steltman, named after the client for which it was designed, is made in
natural oak and is available in both left and right-handed versions.
steltman_chair.html
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T chair by William Katavolos, Ross litell and Douglas Kelly
U.S.A., 1953
t_chair.html
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Tatlin chair by Vladimir Tatlin
U.S.S.R., 1927
Vladimir Tatlin was a leader of the Russian Constructivist movement, and the
Tatlin is the only existing chair from this period. The example shown here is,
as far as I know, the only production model since Tatlin's own prototype. It
differs from the original in that the frame has been made in steel instead of
bent wood, because of the apparent impossibility of producing a wood frame
of sufficient soundness. Tatlin was deeply involved in the making of flying
machines. He created great winged forms made out of literally bentwood
skeletons, covered in canvas and occasionally reinforced with whalebone. His
structures stretched the tensile and loadbearing capacities of the wood to the
utmost, and clearly this chair is an adaptation of the principle learnt for these
primitive exercises in aerodynamics - the flow of stress through load-bearing
members from tight grouping to a wide splay.
In the bentwood prototype, the points where the lines met - on the ground
and half way up the back - were bound with cane. In the present model there
are single screws visible at each of these points. The only other change from the original structure is the tightening of the curve where the back leg tube leaves the floor. This makes the legs more vertical and considerably less graceful.
The seat is a quite distinct unit, placed within the structural web of this linear chair. It is a modified tractor saddle with contoured padding and an intricately tailored leather covering, and is beautiful in its own right. This remains a most elegant chair, and shows no sign of looking dated after the almost half century between conception and production, though the present model is not quite the graceful, swooping, organic form that Tatlin originally designed.
The original Tatlin chair, made in the same way that Tatlin built his flying contraptions, with bent wood, bound by split cane, supporting a simple seat element.
tatlin_modern_chair.html
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Torneraj - (You'll come back) armchair by Piero de Rossi
Italy, 1969
Bya clever arrangement of internal hollows and thickness, the Torneraj manages to become a very good armchair when sat upon and a quarter segment of a large cylinder when unoccupied. As in several cases of recent Italian design the use of stretch fabric and cast foam has made it possible to be comfortable sitting on almost any shape.
tomeraj_armchair.html
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Tripolina by Joseph Beverly Fenby
England, 1877
tripolina_chair.html
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Up 1 chair by Gaetano Pesce
Italy, 1969
up_1_modern_chair.html
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Wassily chair by Marcel Breuer
Germany, 1925
wassily_chair_by_marcel_breuer.html
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THE chair by Hans Wegner
Denmark, 1949
This is perhaps the best known of Wegner's extensive range of chair designs.
It epitomizes the characteristic qualities of his work - classicism, sophistication,
a finely drawn structure and impeccably finished traditional materials. The design is simple, beautifully proportioned and modulated - it appears effortless, but is the result of a long and painstaking development through models and prototypes. The wide seat is a woven cane membrane: the chair is also available
with an upholstered seat.
While all the parts seem to flow into each other making a unified form, the
transition from one part to the next is always expressed. In the case of the arm
to leg connection, for example, this is achieved by a slight recess at the joint
which also prevents any unsightly shifting caused by the possible shrinkage of
the wood. There is an elegant and ingenious finger joint connecting the arms
to the backrest.
Wegner is not primarily concerned with the architectural aspects of chair
design, nor with innovation for its own sake. His ideas flow more from the
chair as it emerged from the nineteenth century. The design seems to have an
affinity with the Arts and Crafts movement furniture and with the Riemerschmid
chair (p. 25). His designs have been influential,in Scandinavia particularly,
where there has been an apparently endless succession of refinements to a
simple chair structure, mostly using fine woods, leather, canvas and cane.
A version of Wegner's THE chair with a leather seat.
wegner_modern_chair.html
