Chart Designers

In this blog I am going to describe five different designers with their product from distinctive eras. First of I am going to begin with De Stijl, in this era their main attraction was for harmony and order through a universal language of form. A different approach from the dada movement. As from the nonsense of DADA they wanted to make something that could be understood from everybody. This style was restricted to the use of straight lines: only all about lines, even in architecture and design. Right angles, straight lines and pure primary colours and non colours (black and white).

 RED BLUE CHAIR

Gerrit Rietveld’s revolutionary Red/Blue chair of 1918, this chair was exhibited at the Bauhaus in 1923 and inspired Marcel Breuer’s later tubular metal B3 Wassily chair 1925-27.  This chair is the result of a practical work of art; it is like a sculpture in the form of a chair. Using the same principles of horizontals verticals lines and its colour scheme of primary colours, red, yellow, blue and black.

Later on the Bauhaus was introduced this was the first school of design that combined crafts and the fine arts, and was famous for design. The German use to call it the “school of building”. They were not capable of understand this type of school for them it did not matter much. A well-known designer Marcel Breuer on his stay he made the first tubular metal chair B3 (1925). He wanted to spread his idea of sitting on “ springy columns of air”. Two of the most known products he created are the B3 (Wassily) and the hugely successful B32 (Cesca).

 WASSILY CHAIR

His B3 or Wassily chair was designed for the accommodation of Wassily Kandinsky. This chair was made by bent tubular steel and canvas. This chair has an elegant look. The canvas seat, back, and arms seem to float in space. The body of the user does not touch the steel frame. 

Breuer spoke of the chair as "my most extreme work . . . the least artistic, the most logical, the least 'cozy' and the most mechanical."

 Referencing for the quote - (Bernard Polster, Claudia Neumann, Markus Schuler  and Fredrick Leven, 2004. The AZ of Modern design)

This era does not have a starting point or the last days of it because it is still in use the same methods and designs all over. This is called the Organic Design has the meaning of connecting the design with its surrounding. Each designer makes his studies on the environment around. Whether it is nature, cities, urban etc. They used organic shapes, soft flowing forms, natural materials such as stone and wood to connect with the spirit of nature.

Alvar Aalto in 1924 he married the designer, Aino Mariso and for five years they conducted experiments together into the bending of wood. Having turned to laminated wood and plywood as his materials of choice in 1929, Aalto began investigating veneer bonding and the limits of moulding plywood. These experiments resulted in Aalto’s most amazing chairs, the No 41(Paimio) and the No 31 (cantilevered). Aalto believed that his most important contribution to furniture design was his solving of the old age problem of connecting vertical and horizontal elements.

43 CHAISE LOUNGE

                     

Ron Arad is an Israel designer, after his education in Jerusalem he travelled to England to expand his ideas and to get known better. He was not only creating new products but also architecture and graphic design. As for products he focused more on chairs and the mostly used material is metal. Arad's work has been described as scary with that heavy concrete and the cuts of the metal. A similar product of Arad to Alvar Aalto is the AFTER SPRING/BEFORE SUMMER CHAISE LOUNGE with the 43 CHAISE LOUNGE, they have the flowing shape and it is for the same usage. 

                               AFTER SPRING/BEFORE SUMMER CHAISE LOUNGE

From the first look you can see the beauty in it but on the other hand it does not look comfortable and not ergonomic well. He mainly designed this chair for a different look and style. He used steel but in different layers and thickness. He wanted to see the flow in the chair with one single sheet of steel, the main thing he gave much importance is the gap in the middle where you can sit in it and it prevent you from slippery.

Verner panton was a master of pop design in the 1960s. He experimented mostly with plastics and in vibrant and exotic colors. Panton started his own style when he produced the cone chair in 1959. This style led him to a large number of different ideas and products. Panton’s most well known furniture models are still in production.

                                                                      PANTON CHAIR

The most famous chair of Panton is the Panton chair itself. This was build because designers thought of a single material and in a single cast. They wanted something different from a normal back support and four legs. Panton experimented with various materials, especially with acrylic and fiberglass-reinforced plastic as well as rigid foam. He founded that the best material was Luran-S, a plastic reinforced without fiberglass. Here we can compare the Panton chair with the AFTER SPRING/BEFORE SUMMER CHAISE LOUNGE it is made in one single moulde with a smooth shape making them similar to each other. They were not influenced from each other but when one puts them together u can see the comparison in them.

Reference: 

:Bernard Polster, Claudia Neumann, Markus Schuler  and Fredrick Leven, 2004. The AZ of Modern design

:Charlotte and Peter Fiell. Design of the 20^th Century

:Verner Panton / Design Museum Collection (Year N/A) Design Museum [Online] Available from: http://designmuseum.org/design/verner-panton [Accessed: 18th January 2014]

:Christian Galli, 2011. Minimum Design, Ron Arad 

: Hans Janssen and Michael White, 2011.The Story of De Stijl Mondrian to Van Doesburg.