Breuer's first designs for aluminium furniture date from 1932 and in November of that year he applied for patents to protect his 'Frames for Pliant Chairs', which included the precursor of the present chair. The following year a further application was made for the identical designs in Switzerland (see: Wilk, p.117). Breuer's designs were first marketed by the Swiss firm of Wohnbedarf, an enterprise set up to promote architect designed furniture and accessories for the home. Their range included work by le Corbusier, Aalto, Breuer and the Swiss designers, Flora and Alfred Steiger and Emil Roth. Although the Swiss company Embru were the main manufacturers for Wohnbedarf, Breuer himself had signed contracts for the production of his aluminium with L. & C. Arnold, in Germany, Stylclair in France and A. L. Colombo in Italy by the end of 1933. By 1934 he had also contracted with the Société Industrielle d'Ameublement in Belgium and was in negotiation with Induventa in Holland, Luminium Ltd. in England and Artek in Finland. In 1933 Embru persuaded Breuer to submit five of his designs, including the precursor for the present design, to the international competition of the Best Aluminium Chair, sponsored by Alliance Aluminium Cie of France. Breuer's designed were awarded first prize by each of the two separate juries, one respresenting the aluminium industry, the other representing the International Congress of Modern Architecture.

Breuer continued to promote his design for the aluminium chaise longue after his departure from Germany for England in 1935. A drawing by Breuer of the present chair, dated 5/2/35 (now in the Pritchard Archive at the University of Norwich and reproduced here), shows his modification of the 1932 design as submitted to the manufacturers Tubecraft Ltd., who had expressed an interest in producing Breuer's design in the United Kingdom. The drawing is inscribed Isokon Ltd. /Tubecraft Ltd., suggesting that the design was being considered, at least by Breuer, for inclusion in the Isokon range. It is not known whether this particular version ever went into production and it is possible that this present model was made expressly for Pritchard's approval. It was at the suggestion of Walter Gropius, with the full sanction of Pritchard, that Breuer adapted his design for this aluminium chair to create the famous Long Chair for Isokon in 1936

See: Christopher Wilk, Marcel Breuer, Furniture and Interiors, New York 1981, p.115, et seq
Magdalena Droste, Manfred Ludewig, Marcel Breuer, Cologne 1992, p.50, similar chair illustrated