Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: Personal chairs

1988

Work of Art for Project, Office Furniture Prototype

Light-weight armchair for office use; frame of high strength monocoque construction, lacquered surface and upholstered seat in heavy duty ribbed silk. Functioning prototype was included in the 12 feet by 18 feet office interiors for one person, constructed by C.E.S.

Created by:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black

Content of

Project

The Personal Workplace - New System of Office Furniture 1988 to 1990

Zeeland, MI, U.S.A.

Office Furniture, Designed , Two personal offices with furniture prototypes built by C.E.S.

Client:

Herman Miller, Inc. - Rob Harvey, Vice President

C.E.S. staff:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black

Design and construction process:

Theree design principles guided the development of the project: 1) Layout of the personal work space by their users in order to meet their own personal needs; this process is achievable through the use of a computer program developed at C.E.S. which carries a worker through the design process. 2) Use of flexible manufacturing techniques, which allow individualisation of each piece of furniture, without increasing costs; the purpose of this feature is to eliminate the modularity that is part and parcel of current systems. 3) The basis of design is the real human needs and desires, not on the latest trend.

Project stages:

Generic rules for office layout process Use of full scale mock-ups Fabrication of full size furniture prototypes and office rooms by C.E.S. Design Development drawings done after fabrication

Herman Miller, the second largest manufacturer of office furniture in the United States, commissioned C.E.S. to develop the "personal workplace", a new system of furniture, which aimed at changing the nature of the American workplace completely. The emphasis was on ...

Contents

Drawings

Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: Personal Chair - Sketches 02/02/1988

Sketches, Perspective, Elevation

Designers:

Christopher Alexander, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

Medium:

Original on Paper

Size:

8 1/2"x11"

Two pages of pencil sketches by Christopher Alexander for the work armchair.

Records

Herman Miller New Office Furniture System: Status Report: Japanese Silk Panel, Working Armchair & Rolling Bench 01/01/1989

Design Matters, Notes & Sketches

Authors:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black, Center for Environmental Structure, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

3 pages analyzing 1. The production status for each one of the three pieces of furniture in an overall summary; 2. The level of engineering, listing the months of design effort, of the engineering and modelling effort, and of the ...

Photographs

SEE ALL Photographs

References

Reports

Herman Miller Furniture Systems: The Personal Workplace - A System of Office Furniture Designed for Comfort: Vol 2. Catalog - The New Line of Furniture 01/01/1988

Project, Project Report

Authors:

Christopher Alexander, Artemis Anninou, Gary Black, Center for Environmental Structure, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

33-page document, which includes an Introduction, list of the twenty nine items of furniture available with descriptions for each one. The items of furniture are chosen with the intension to allow the user to find a way in which he/she ...

Photographs