UTRECHT

Gerrit Rietveld 1935

Gerrit Rietveld came up with the design for the Utrecht armchair in 1935 while working for the Metz & Co. department store in Amsterdam, where his brief was to make a chair for serial production. Taking market needs into account, while privileging a comfortable and relaxing experience, led to the elements of the chair being treated as separate units. As a consequence, the chair became an icon of both the Neoplastic movement (aka De Stijl), and of Rietveld’s experimental vision. In 2015, the original version of the chair, without the feet, was made available alongside the one with, as part of the Mutazioni collection, and was relaunched with its dimensions adjusted to take account of changes in people’s height over the previous 80 years.