Knoll International
Executive chair (1950), Eero SaarinenEero Saarinen (1910-1961) was the son of famous architect and Cranbrook Academy of Art Director Eliel Saarinen. After studying sculpture in Paris and architecture at Yale, Saarinen returned to Cranbrook in 1934, where he would meet his friend and creative collaborator, Charles Eames.
Together with Eames he experimented with bent plywood. Saarinen focussed on a chair that gave comfort through the shape of its shell, not the depth of its cushioning. He ended up making the most iconic, and comfortable, series of chairs of the modern furniture movement. Introduced as the 71 and 72 (without armrests) series, these iconic chairs, often referred to as ‘that chair with the hole in the back’, is manufactured by Knoll to this day.
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