Vitra’s Massive New Book Is a Treasure Trove of Furniture Design History

The Dutch architect and cabinetmaker Gerrit Rietveld designed the precursor to his famous Red Blue Chair in 1918/1919. He submitted the unpainted model to an exhibition at the Museum for Applied Arts in Haarlem, which included a competition for the best design for a simple lounge chair that could be manufactured for less than 35 guilders—roughly $20. The resulting design is an open spatial composition, corresponding to the principles of the De Stijl movement, of which Rietveld was a member. "The construction helps to interconnect the components without mutilating them or allowing one to dominate the other, with the resulting effect that the whole stands free and clear within the space and the form is further emphasized by the material," he says.