Classic chairs

These designs are among those still acknowledged as iconic.

THE SHELL CHAIR
Designed by American architects and furniture designers Charles and Ray Eames in the 40s, this was the first industrially manufactured plastic chair. A simple, clean design, the pared down version with the steel tubular legs has been endlessly replicated. But the one with the trussed Eiffel tower legs is distinctive.

CHAIR BY LLOYD WRIGHT
American architect Frank Lloyd Wright once said, “Every chair must be designed for the building it will be in.” Wright designed this chair in 1903 for the Larkin office in Buffalo.

BARCELONA CHAIR
This is the iconic chair designed by architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe for the German Pavilion at the Ibero-American Exposition of 1929. You can see variations of it in modern office reception areas. Mies also created the popular Brno chair, an early design in cantilevered steel tubes — with a base made of a single, seamless steel tube folded in to form a “C”.

 

WASSILY CHAIR
Marcel Breur, who taught cabinet making at the Bauhaus, designed this chair in 1925-26. The Wassily too was fashioned out of seamless steel tubes and canvas, and continues to be in production even today.