Michael Thonet designed this cafe/bistro chair in the 19th century. It is easily the most mass-produced and best-selling chair ever: cheap, easily reproducible, assembled and packaged. (Ubiquitous in almost all Parisian cafes, and pretty much absent in Berlin). Here's an article on the chair from the NYtimes: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/arts/10iht-design10.1.17621906.html?_r=1And a blog devoted to it: http://www.chairblog.eu/category/chair-designer/michael-thonet/
A short chronic of important chair-designers:
ReplyDeleteGerrit Rietveld
Marcel Breuer (19th century)
Alvar Aalto
Jean Prouvé
Charles Eames, Eero Saarinen and Harry Bertoia (mass production after WWII)
Hans Wegner and Arne Jacobsen (scandinavian, wood)
Verner Panton and Joe Colombo (sixties, synthetics meet popart)
Memphis and Archizoom (seventies design collectives bringing fun into furniture design)
Philippe Starck, Ron Arad and Gaetano Pesce (eighties, individuality leads to pluralism of styles)
Frank Gehry and Jasper Morrison (simplicity in shape and material)
Ron Arad and Marc Newson (imagination in line with functionality and mass production)