Five things You Didn’t Know About the Eames Lounge Chair

The Eames Lounge Chair & Ottoman replica is hands-down the star of mid-20th century modern furniture. It is the emblem of modern furniture design and one of the most replicated pieces of furniture to ever have sprung from the mid-20th century. But besides these well-known facts, the Eames Lounge Chair has some hidden secrets that may not be known to even the biggest fans of the lounge chair and ottoman. Having endured a history that spans over 60 years, the Eames lounge Chair & Ottoman has its own share of arcane facts, including those regarding its designers, Charles and ray Eames. Below are is some interesting trivia about the Eames Lounge Chair and its creators.

“Eames Lounge Chair” was a 1956 short film:

The lounge chair and ottoman was also the star of the eponymous film. The film was a promotional screening of the chair that showed the public how it was constructed. Designers Charles and Ray Eames made the film themselves, as Ray Eames had studied the art of filmmaking and had created some films sixteen films herself. This film, like many of the time, was produced in black and white. It exudes the aura of simplicity, telling of the modernist movement, in that the film shows a man putting the chair together and shipping it out.

WWII Stalled the Creation of the Lounge Chair

Charles Eames was assigned the duty of designing durable molded plywood splints for the US Air Force in the onset of World War 2. During this time, he and Ray Eames had to defer planning on the lounge chair and ottoman. Although the Air Force project had the purpose of wound-rectifying, since the splints were used to hold up broken feet and arms, it proved to be viable for Charles’ lounge chair vision. Creating the splints had given Charles new methods of working with molded plywood and curving them into complex shapes, which was a major foundation for the lounge chair and the first molded plywood chairs designed by the Eames.’

What Made the Eames’ Confident About the Lounge Chair:

After designing the first prototype of the lounge chair, Charles and Ray decided to do a little test-run of their chair and ottoman. They lent the chair and ottoman to a friend and this trial with it had exceeded the Eames’ expectations, which were simply to create a resting chair. It turned out that the chair had the potency of a sleeping pill for one of their friends, who had almost instantly fallen into a deep sleep on the chair. This little experiment was the very first success of this chair and ottoman.

The Lounge Chair & Ottoman Was Not the Eames’ Best-Selling Chair

The Eames lounge Chair replica surely is one of our best-sellers and is a modern furniture icon. But contrary to popular belief, this was not the Eames’ best-selling piece of furniture. Their best-selling chair is a system called the Tandem Sling Seating, currently mass-produced for airports. The husband-wife duo created these seats in 1962, when they were tasked with creating comfortable and durable public seating for O’Hare International Airport. These chairs use a sling system that can bind up to ten chairs together. They were wide enough to avoid crowding between adjacent passengers. They are currently in use by millions of airplane travelers.