Marcel Breuer - Knoll - Armchair - Wassily Chair

Designed by Marcel Breuer in 1925, inspired by a bicycle frame, the B3 Wassily represents a piece of modern design history and of the Knoll Studio collection starting from 1968, the year in which the brand purchased the rights to the design, at that time held by the company Gavina Sp. A. The example up for auction, the rare version in white leather made by Knoll in the '90s, is in good condition. The leather is still sturdy with minor signs of age, and after general cleaning and treatment of the leather with nutrition products, it has gone back to being pure white with no stains. The frame, after having been polished, is in very good condition. With the 'Marcel Breuer' brand mark on the backrest and 'Knoll' sticker on the tube. Dimensions: 72 x 79 x 72 cm. 'Design Radicale' offers insured shipping to Italy and Europe, shipping costs as shown. For shipping to the rest of the world, the cost is approximate. We will provide a quote when the auction is finished, depending on the destination. The Wassily Chair, also known as chair model B3, was designed by Marcel Breuer. In 1925, he was the director of a woodworking shop at Bauhaus of Dessau. This chair was revolutionary in its use of materials (eisengarn and curved nickel-plated steel tubes) , as well as for its production methods. After having tested the solidity of steel tubes used on the construction of the Adler bicycle, Breuer thought of using steel tubing to build furniture. To build this chair, Breuer sought the help of Adler, but the company did not accept. Therefore, he went to Mannesmann that had already developed innovative techniques on working with steel tubes in 1885-1886. He had the single elements that he needed bent to build his first prototype. In the same year Le Corbusier had presented a steel tube staircase 'built like a bicycle frame' at the Exhibition of Decorative Arts in Paris. The position of the seat and back of the B 3 attest to the influence of Gerrit Rietveld's red and blue chair (Rood-blauwe stoel) . The B 3 chair, initially produced by Standard Möbel of Berlin, became a mass product in the 1960s after Dino Gavina, after meeting the Hungarian designer in New York in 1962, convinced him to re-issue the tubular chair. When Gavina learned that Kandinsky had requested that the first specimen be destined for his own living room, he decided to produce it with the name Wassily. In 1968 Knoll of New York bought Gavina Spa of Bologna, including the production of the chair, which is still in production.