I decided to start
with the one I had heard the most , Knoll. As soon as I logged in into their
website, it is obvious that they have only gotten bigger since their beginnings,
the first thing I noticed trying to search for the “about” category was that today they have 7 different branches from Knoll Office,Knoll
Studio,Knoll extra, Knoll textile, Knoll Kids, Spinneybeck and Filzfelt*.
“We offer thoughtful,
inventive products that respond to individual work styles and transcend
multiple generations. Furniture, accessories, textiles, felts and leathers that
stimulate the senses and allow you to express who you are and what you value. “
Hans Knoll born 1914
in Germany, part of and furniture
manufacturer family that started with the work of his grandfather designing high quality furniture, only a few
year after in 1917Florence Schust was born in Michigan , same place that in
1930’s was the place for the Cranbrook Academy of Arts, a new era of design was
born, years after both would get married after meeting in an interior design project in
1941. The united states of America was the place to design ,By 1938 The Hans G. Knoll
Furniture Company is funded by Hans Knoll and establishes in a small space on East 72nd Street.
Their signature is
“modern always”, they have been creating furniture for work and residential
spaces , and its recognized worldwide. Even though they are from the Us, they
state on their website that they follow Bauhaus and Cranbrook Academy of Art following the ideals of Florence and Hans
Knoll .They also highlight the importance that as a company they give to
furniture as something that compliments architecture. They combine the
craftsmanship with today’s technology to create new shapes and to reflect the
company values. They also state that even though the beginnings of Knoll where
based with modernists, today they are also opening their horizons to
contemporary designers because they don’t want to be defined only by the past. Their first works were for designing practical
workspaces and workspaces is their speciality today also.
“We connect you to your work environment. While knowledge from the past can be used to serve our customers today, our spirit and methodology are, and have always been, forward-looking. We evaluate technologies. We assess new materials. We test new processes. “
Some of their most recognized pieces are the
Barcelona Chair by Mies Van der Rohe (1948), the Diamond Chair by Harry
Bertoias on 1952, The Hardoy chair in 1947 and the Pedestal Collection by by Eero Saarinen.
Herman Miller
It is also from the united states and was specialized in the same are
office furniture but also for the federal government, Miller´s son in law D.J
Pree bought the Michigan Star Furniture
company in 1923 and decided to recall it in honor of his father in law
and renamed it after him because for him Herman Miller was a man of integrity
and he wanted that to be a reflection in this new company. Herman Miller was
also know just as Knoll as symbol of modern furniture , both of them where the
biggest companies specialized in the design
of offices and works with bigger designers of the times, in the case e
of Herman Miller those names where Ray
Eames, George Nelson and others. Today
they have decided to continue that line of collaboration with the “it”
designers of our times working with names such as Alexander Girard , Don
Chadwick, Isamu Noguchi and
many others.
As the same as Knoll, Herman miller had broaden its horizons to places
like healthcare solutions, education solutions, home solutions and others but
it hasn’t open to other areas of design besides furniture like Knoll did with
Knoll textiles for example.
Comparing the information found in their website, I have the feeling
that Herman miller is a more humble version of Knoll, they haven’t got as big as knoll or at least that’s what you perceive
reading their timelines. But at the same time having a smaller pictures had
helped them to put more care into each one of their 5 areas (home, work, healthcare,
education and government) making amazing designs, worldwide known, For my
personal opinion you can even see in their website how they take care of each
detail not only into the furniture design but also onto the
whole space, which had made them specialists. I always have thought a
more focus work and a more specific target helps you get a deeper development
and better results. They also establish much more evidently their concerns as a
company for example with their environmental friendly facilities, and company standards
and visions making the whole experience more personal.
The first thing that
caught my eye when I entered their website is that their whole homepage had
pictures of their collection with various designers , from Luca Nichetto, Karl
Lagerfeld, Le Corbusier, Phillip Stark and others, so clearly their reflection
as a company and as Italian one is about the recognition, standards, and
excellence in design .
You can even emphasize
this going to their identity statement in which at least 90% of it mentions Italian
and international designers and architects. Searching through their history
they have a timeline that meet more the standards of Knoll , the company was founded in 1927 by Cesare and Umberto
Cassina, and it was the responsible of bringing industrial design to Italy. Let’s
remember the lider of this where the United States, and the Europe scene was
under the effect of having the interwar period right in their territory. The
company then fulfilled the role of encouraging designers to go beyond of what
they have been showed until then, they passed from handcraft man shift to mass
production and as the same as Knoll and Herman Miller they started
collaborating with designers. Something that they do mention also but their US
pairs don’t is the collaborative work with architects also, not trying to say
that Knoll or Herman Miller don’t have them but they don’t state it that
clearly. Until beginnings of the 90’s their whole timeline shows mainly chairs
with names such as Gaetano Pesce, frank Lloyd Wright and Toshiyuki Kita, they also started a collection with
pieces from Rietvield, Mackintosh, and others. They also bought the reproduction
rights for Le Corbusier’s designs. Only after 2000 we start seeing a few tables
and sofas , but chairs are their main feature in their timeline.
Going through their products do they have as first categories sofas and armchairs,
followed by outdoor, tables, beds, desks, office, cabinets, chairs and special
editions , showing a similarity in products with its US companions but in a
much little spectrum.
I already feel this post as gone away too long so I will leave my comparison
trough until here, the main thing is that all 3 of them where created in the
interwar period, a period that affected in a more close way to Europe, which I
think allowed Knoll and Herman Miller to grow in a much faster way than
Cassina. All of them are linked through industrial and modern design and also
with office furniture design, let’s not forget only a few years later their
foundations Offices where going to take the design world, meeting new offices
with modular spaces and new needs for their workers. Finally all of them take
great importance in the collaboration with designers, and all of them also have
at least one big designer from the modern times in their timelines remembering
the beginnings of them but also looking for new horizons with new
collaborations.
Sources:
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