Trully striking and comfortable. The Ant chair is a classic of modern chair design. It was designed in 1952 by Arne Jacobsen for use in the canteen of the Danish pharmaceutical firm Novo Nordisk. The Ant ("Myren" in Danish) was named for its approximate similarity to the outline of an ant with its head raised.
The chair was designed to be light, stable, easy to stack up, and to minimise tangling the user's feet. The original model had three plastic legs and a seat made from form-moulded laminated veneer; Novo ordered just 300 of them. They were manufactured by Fritz Hansen. The chair has since proved very popular although the plastic in the legs was replaced by tubular steel, and a version with four legs was also made.
Arne Emil Jacobsen (11 February 1902 – 24 March 1971) was a Danish architect and designer, exemplar of the 'Danish Modern' style. In addition to his architectural work he created a number of highly original chairs and other furniture. He received several international distinctions and medals.
Arne Jacobsen´s designs came into existence as brief sketches and were then modelled in plaster or cardboard in full size. He kept on working until his revolutionary ideas for new furniture had been realized at the utmost perfection. The "Ant" from 1952 became the starting point of his world fame as a furniture designer and became the first of a number of lightweight chairs with seat and back in one oiece of moulded wood.
Model "3107" from 1955 is often merely called " The Number Seven Chair". It was launched in beech, black and white. The colour scale has through the years been further developed by a.o. the Danish architect Verner Panton and the Danish painter Poul Gernes 1925-96 and today includes a variety of colours in lacquer or lazure as well as beech, maple, ash, and cherry. "3107" has become the most important success in Danish furniture history - manufactured in more than 5 million copies.
The Royal Hotel 1956-61, situated in Copenhagen, is one of Arne Jacobsen´s masterpieces. For the decoration of the hotel he designed several pieces of furniture, lamps and fabrics, and also cutlery, glasses, and door handles. As significant counterpoints to the stiffly upright, monumental building his easy chair, the "Swan" and the "Egg", stand out as organic sculptures.
During the 1960´es Arne Jacobsen turned to forms as the circle, cylinder, triangle, and cubus. On the whole, his mind as an architect began to influence his design. Both the stainless steel tableware set "Cylinda-Line" and the lamp series "AJ" reflect this. Common to all Arne Jacobsen´s designs is that they have become international design classics.
"The Ant" and "The Number Seven" ´chairs made Arne Jacobsen world famous as a furniture designer and made Fritz Hansen an international manufacturer of design and quality furniture. Fritz Hansen´s collection of timeless furniture includes both well-known Danish classics and more recent furniture series designed by Danish and international designers.
My all time favourite chairs.
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