The history of design is large and exciting. We could spend a whole life speaking about designers, products, styles or planes.
Today we want to start a new section on our blog, where we will do a historical overview about this exciting world. Follow us throughout design history!
Charlotte Perriand.
Charlotte Perriand (Paris, October 24, 1903 – October 27, 1999), was a French designer known by her iconic 20th-century furniture. Her work aimed to create functional living spaces in the belief that better design helps in creating a better society.
Perriand was born in Paris, her father was a tailor and her mother a haute couture seamstress.
Her stellar drawing abilities caught the attention of her high school art teacher, and her mother eventually encouraged her to enrol in the Ecole de L’Union Centrale des Arts Décoratifs (“Central Union School of Decorative Arts”) in 1920 to study furniture design until 1925.
During this year, her school projects were selected to be part of the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes. In addition, her designs were exhibited on Galeries Lafayette’s walls.
Two years after graduating, Perriand received wide praise from the press for her project “Bar sous le toit”. Her name started to be known, but she was not satisfied with creating designs just for the well-off. She wanted to work for Le Corbusier and to create serial production for low-cost housing. When she applied to work at Le Corbusier, she was rejected: “We don’t embroider cushions here” they told her. A month later, they visited the Bar sous le toit at the Salon d’ Automne, and were so impressed that they offered her a job in furniture design.
From 1927 to 1937 she worked in the Le Corbusier’s atelier, later calling that experience “a privilege”. There, she was in charge of their interiors work, and in 1928 she designed three chairs: the B301 sling back chair, the LC2 Grand Confort chair and the B306 chaise longue. The principal feature of these chairs was the tubular steel frames.
In the 30s, Perriand was also involved with many leftist organizations such as the Association des Écrivains et Artistes Révolutionnaires, and Maison de la Culture, and she helped to found the Union des Artistes Modernes.
After leaving Le Corbusier, she began to work with Jean Prouvé. During the war, Perriand designed military barracks and furnishings for temporary housing. When the war finished, the team disbanded until 1951. Year in which they met again When Germans arrived to occupy Paris in 1940, she left France to travel to Japan as an official advisor for industrial design to the Ministry for Trade and Industry. Despite she was there to change the status quo among the Japaneses artisans, designers, and architects, she was greatly inspired by the myriad experiences she encountered. Seven months later, she exhibited products were natural materials, such as wood and bamboo, were the main characters.
On her way back to Europe she was detained and forced into Vietnamese exile because of the war. She used this time, to study woodwork and weaving.
In the years after World War II, interest in using new methods and materials highly increased. So when she returned to Paris in 1946, her work had high demand and she worked on many projects such as ski resorts and students housing.
In 1998, the year before she died, she published an autobiography, Une Vie de création (A life of creation).