Section
Design
Charles and Ray Eames introduced their lounge chair with Herman Miller in 1956, and it has been in production ever since. Design is built around objects with that kind of staying power and the people who made them. Dieter Rams spent decades at Braun and wrote ten principles that product designers still quote. Arne Jacobsen drew the Egg chair in 1958 for the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen. Isamu Noguchi made his first Akari paper lamps in 1951 with lantern makers in Gifu. Fritz Haller and Paul Schärer created the USM Haller system in 1965, and Ettore Sottsass showed the first Memphis Group collection in Milan in 1981, furniture that looked like a prank on good taste. Architecture runs alongside, from the Bauhaus to Pierre Jeanneret's work in Chandigarh. The stories explain how things were made and how to tell an original from a reproduction.
Stories
Design4 min read
The Wassily Chair Was Never Kandinsky's
A bicycle, a Bauhaus workshop and an Italian who needed a better name than B3. How Breuer's steel tube club chair got a painter's first name.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
The Egg Chair Was Built for a Hotel Lobby
Arne Jacobsen designed a Copenhagen tower down to the ashtrays. The chair he put in its lobby outlived almost everything else in the building.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
Dieter Rams and the Ten Principles of Good Design
The Braun design chief who made less feel like more. What his ten principles actually ask of an object, and why they still shape the gear you buy.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
Isamu Noguchi's Coffee Table Started as a Grudge
A pilfered model, a three-legged insult and a summer trip to Gifu gave Isamu Noguchi his two best-selling objects. Both are still in production.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
The Panton Chair Has No Legs and No Seams
One sweep of plastic, held up by nothing but its own curve. It took Verner Panton a decade to find a factory and Vitra five materials to get it right.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
Memphis, Sottsass and the Laminate That Broke Good Taste
A Dylan record on repeat, a gallery in Milan and furniture surfaced like a diner counter. Memphis lasted seven years and still hasn't gone away.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
The Eames Lounge Chair, 1956 to Now
Molded plywood, soft leather and a TV debut in 1956. How Charles and Ray Eames reinvented the club chair, and how to spot the real thing today.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
Ligne Roset's Togo, the Sofa That Is Nothing but Foam
No frame and no legs, only foam. Michel Ducaroy's crumpled 1973 seat sold slowly at first, then turned into a social media fixture with a counterfeit problem.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design5 min read
The Bauhaus Lasted 14 Years and Rewired Design
A school that changed cities twice, lost three directors and was shut down by the Nazis still decides what your furniture looks like.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
USM Haller, the Office Furniture That Became a Flex
A Swiss locksmith's grandson, an architect obsessed with systems and a Paris bank order for 600 workstations. The chrome grid is still being bolted together.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design4 min read
Donald Judd Built Furniture Because Stores Failed Him
A pair of sinks, a bed for his kids and a small town in far West Texas. How the minimalist sculptor ended up designing furniture by the dozen.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
Design5 min read
Pierre Jeanneret's Chandigarh Chairs and the Fakes Problem
Government office chairs from a planned Indian city became a luxury status object. Then came the scrap auctions, the reconstructions, the replicas and the police.
By Quiet Menace Editors /
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