Miniature Chairs 4

This collection includes miniature reproductions of some of the most famous pieces of furniture of the 20th century, 1:12 scale.

1. Hill House, 1902
Designer: Charles Rennie Mackintosh

Charles Rennie Mackintosh was a skilled interior designer, painter and decorator who renown for his inventive interpretation of Art Nouveau. His participation in such landmark events such as the 1902 exhibit of Modern Decorative Arts in Turin and the 1931 Exhibition of the Vienna Secession School solidified his place in the history of design.

The narrow Hill House Chair was meant by Charles Rennie Mackintosh to be a decoration, and not a functional piece of furniture. It is constructed of ashwood, black or a walnut finish. The seat is leather or fabric.

2. Chaise Longue LC4, 1928
Designers: Le Corbusier, Pierre Jeanneret, Charlotte Perriand

The chaiselongue unveiled at the Salon d'Automne des Artistes Decorateurs in 1929 is the most famous of the furniture designs by le Corbusier and the only one on which he worked personally. He called it “resting machine”. It is most remarkable that the rest position can be adjusted without any mechanism, simply gravity will keep it in place.

3. LC 3, 1928
Designers: Le Corbusier, Pierre Jeanneret, Charlotte Perriand

LC 3 is a large armchair with chrome plated tubular steel frame holding loose cushions filled with polyurethane foam. Le Corbusier used the golden ratio. The design reminds of Le Corbusier’s early experiments with filled and empty spaces. The Le Corbusier group referred to their LC2 and LC3 collections as "cushion baskets" which they designed in 1928 as a modernist response to the traditional club chair. The pieces reverse the standard structures of sofas and chairs by having frames that are externalized.

The differences among the groups are that the LC2 is more compact, and the LC3 has down-wrapped cushions that create a softer look and feel.

4. Bocca, 1936
Designers: Studio 65

This sofa pays homage to Salvador Dali's earlier Mae West sofa of 1936 and can be viewed as an early example of Redesign. With its anti-establishment connotations. Surrealism was highly influential to the 1960s and 1970s Anti-Design movement. Inspiration for this quintessential Pop design must also have come from Andy Warhol’s series if silk-screens.

Bocca sofa was named for 1950-60s film star Marilyn Monroe. It enters the collection Edra in the stream of Tatlin, Fiori and Mattone.

5. Ball Chair, 1966
Designer: Iiro Aarnio

Iiro Aarnio speaks of the design:: “The idea of the chair was very obvious. We had moved to our first home and I had started my free-lance career in 1962. We had a home but no proper big chair, so I decided to make one, but some way a really new one.

“After some drawing I noticed that the shape of the chair had become so simple that it was merely a ball. I pinned the full scale drawing on the wall and ‚sat' in the chair to see how my head would move when sitting inside it. Being the taller one of us I ‚sat' in the chair and my wife drew the course of my head on the wall. This is how I determined the height of the chair. Since I aimed at a ball shape, the other lines were easy to draw, just remembering that the chair would have to fit through a doorway.

“After this I made the first prototype myself using an inside mould, which has been made using the same principle as a glider fuselage or wing. I covered the plywood body mould with wet paper and laminated the surface with fiberglass, rubbed down the outside, removed the mould from inside, had it upholstered and added the leg. In the end I installed the red telephone on the inside wall of the chair. The naming part of the chair was easy, the Ball Chair was born.

“The result was great. It was the birth of one of the most remarkable chairs in the furniture history of the 20th century.”

6. Marshmallow sofa, 1956
Designers: Irwin Harper, George Nelson

When the Marshmallow sofa was introduced in 1956, the Herman Miller catalog described it as “The first of a series of pieces embodying a new concept in soft seating. We feel that it has possible use not only in the home, but in contract use for lobbies in public buildings where the very fact that it is unusual will be a plus.”

The sofa was reintroduced by Herman Miller after a 34-year hiatus in 1999.