Eames Lounge Chair

The Eames Lounge Chair is a classic of modern design. It has been in production since 1956 and is still just as potent a status symbol as the day the first ones were made.

Charles Eames trained as an architect, but is more well known for his furniture design. He experimented with chairs in the 1930s, but his ideas were too expensive to make commercially. His first successful chair was a revolutionary moulded plywood chair. He found a way to produce chairs economically in the mid 1940s. He and his wife, Ray Eames, made the chairs in their Los Angeles apartment by using a makeshift press driven by peddle power. Herman Miller then mass produced this design from 1946. Even more revolutionarily were Eames' wire frame chairs produced in the 1950s.

It is the lounge chair that is usually referred to as the Eames Chair and it is rumored to have been conceived as a present for the movie director, Richard Wilder.  For this chair Eames used the most expensive contemporary materials. The seat and back were in rosewood ply. Rosewood was the most luxurious wood used in contemporary furniture. The cushions were upholstered in leather. It was the ultimate luxury contemporary chair.

This chair, with its swivel base, started a fashion for swivel chairs upholstered in black leather or vinyl for the home or office.

The Eames Chair is still made by Herman Miller in the US. It is manufactured by Vitra for the European market.

Buy Eames chair

You can buy a genuine Eames Chair manufactured by Vitra from Heals in the UK. The only genuine Eames Lounge Chairs are made by Vitra or Herman Miller.

If you want a cheaper alternative, there are large numbers of copies and lookalikes around. If you want a genuine Eames Chair you do need to be aware of this.

See also

More on the Eames Chair

In compiling this article we found the following publications helpful:

• Contemporary: Architecture and Interiors of the 1950s
• The American Design Adventure

See also:

• Eames lounge chair on eBay
• www.hermanmiller.com

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