Steel tube, chromed, basketwork
Design: Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886-1969) – German architect and designer
Manufacturer: Joseph Müller, Berliner Metallgewerbe
Model: MR 20
Dimensions: c. 81.5 x 54.8 x 86 cm each, seat height: 42.5 cm each, diameter tubular steel 23 mm
This pair of cantilever armchairs ‘MR 20’ by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe comes from the private heritage of professor Hugo Junkers (1859-1935), who was a closely friend of the architect and cooperated with the Bauhaus in Dessau in the 1920s and 1930s. Junkers received the armchairs directly from Mies van der Rohe between 1927 and 1928 in Dessau.

At the end of 1926, the German-American architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe developed the so-called Weißenhof chair inspired by the first cantilever chair design from the Dutchman Mart Stam. By using a curved instead of square pipe course, the model MR10 was developed in an ingeniously simple way as the first elastic cantilever chair. The impressive design was later equipped with additional steel pipe bends acting as armrests: the model MR20. These two models seen as design classics until today, have been produced in these variations by numerous companies.

Condition:

The armchairs are in good, restored condition with usual minimal traces of wear. Slight scratches and abrasions on the chromed steel tube can be scattered found. The basketwork of both armchairs was renewed in the 1960s, in the course of this the original basketwork of the armrests were not renewed.

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886-1969)

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ranks among the most important artists in the field of design and architecture in the first half of the 20th century. His works epitomize the departure into Modernism. He was born in 1886 in Aachen as the son of a building contractor. In 1908, he joined the architecture office of Peter Behrens where he worked closely with Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier and developed his unique architectural concept. Van der Rohe’s principle “less is more” had an ongoing impact on the development of contemporary architecture. In 1930, he was appointed director of Bauhaus in Dessau by Walter Gropius. The Nazi dictatorship forced Mies van der Rohe into exile in 1937. He became the head of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago where he continued to work as an architect. (ala)

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