Knoll

Four Seasons Barstool

Designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, 1958

Created for the Four Seasons Restaurant at the Seagram Building in New York, this design is believed to be a collaborative effort between Mies van der Rohe, who designed the building, and Phillip Johnson, who designed the restaurant. The cantilevered chrome frame, lean profile and meticulous craftsmanship complement van der Rohe’s Flat Bar Brno Chair, which was specified throughout the restaurant. In 2006 Knoll brought the design into mass production for the first time ever.

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Four seasons barstool

Details

FEATURES

The Four Seasons Barstool was designed in 1958 by Mies van der Rohe for the Four Seasons restaurant in New York City. While the barstool was never mass produced, it is now available through KnollStudio.

The Four Seasons restaurant was designed by Phillip Johnson and is housed in the Seagram building in New York City, designed by Mies van der Rohe. The KnollStudio logo and the signature of Mies van der Rohe, Ludwig are stamped into the base of the stool.


CONSTRUCTION

The frame is in bent steel with chrome plating.

The seat is an upholstered leather foam cushion over a plywood form.


FINISHES

The seat can be upholstered in a variety of leathers. This product is available with foam that meets requirements for BS5852.

Dimensions

 
FOUR SEASONS BAR STOOL

43 cm W x 43 cm D x 76 cm H.


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Product Story image

In the mid-1950s the Bronfman family, owners of the Joseph E. Seagram and Sons Corporation, decided to commemorate the company’s centennial by building a modern office tower on Park Avenue in New York. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was selected as architect for the Seagram Building and Philip Johnson was named as his cooperating local partner.

Johnson’s most memorable contribution to the project was the design of the interiors of The Four Seasons restaurant on the ground floor of the building. Johnson, a disciple of Mies, faithfully specified the modern master’s furniture throughout the interior. A Barcelona table and chairs were used in the lobby, and the flat-bar Brno chair was developed for use in the two large dining rooms.

In the bar room, Johnson specified a stool of Miesian style and proportion. No prior drawings by Mies exist for this design and it is thought that it was most likely a collaborative effort by Johnson and Mies. The restaurant opened in November of 1959. In 2004, Carl Magnusson developed the stool for production in Italy; it was introduced in 2006.

Designer image

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe began his career working in his father's stonemasonry business. After an apprenticeship with furniture designer Bruno Paul in Berlin, he joined the office of architect Peter Behrens, whose work presaged the modern movement. In 1912, Mies established his own office in Berlin, and later became a member of the Deutscher Werkbund and Director of the Bauhaus.

He immigrated to the United States in 1938, setting up a practice in Chicago. His buildings include the German Pavilion for the 1929 Barcelona Exposition, the Tugendhat Villa in Brno, Czechoslovakia, the Seagram Building, designed with Philip Johnson, a cluster of residential towers along Chicago's Lakeshore Drive in Chicago, and the Illinois Institute of Technology campus, where he was the director of architecture.

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886 - 1969) Birthplace Germany