A chromed tubular steel and leather 'Siege a dossier Basculant', Model B301

DESIGNED BY LE CORBUSIER, CHARLOTTE PERRIAND AND PIERRE JEANNERET, CIRCA 1929, MANUFACTURED BY THONET, FRANCE, EARLY 1930S

Details
A chromed tubular steel and leather 'Siege a dossier Basculant', Model B301
Designed by Le Corbusier, Charlotte Perriand and Pierre Jeanneret, circa 1929, manufactured by Thonet, France, early 1930s
Original leather seat and back with spring connections, the feet with original rubber shock absorbers and metal tips
25¼in. (64cm.) high
Frame with original Thonet circular label impressed Modèle Le Corbusier P Jeanneret Ch. Perriand Thonet

Lot Essay

See footnote to lot 62.
Le Corbusier's model for this chair seems to have been a simple 'Indian' campaign chair in wood and canvas with free-swinging back, made by Maple & Co. London, a company whom Le Corbusier greatly admired. The very earliest models, made under Perriand's supervision, lacked the extended bar at the back of the arm support; this was modified in Thonet's production models to prevent the back swinging completely without restraint.
The present chair is one of two from the same source. The other, slightly earlier version, is in the permanent collection of the Vitra Design Museum.
See: Art et Décoration, 1929, Salon d'Automne issue.
R. Chavance, Le Meuble Métallique en Série, Mobilier et Décoration, 1929, p. 217 et. seq.
De Fusco, p. 58 et. seq.
Van Geest and Mácel, p. 73.
Ostergard (ed.), exh. cat. no. 75, p. 280.
Vitra Design Museum, exh. cat. no. 23.

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