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    Florence Knoll Bench

    Florence Knoll 1954

    Designed in 1954 as what Florence Knoll modestly referred to as one of the “fill-in pieces that no one else wants to do,” the Florence Knoll Bench now stands as a defining example of modern design. Consistent with all of her designs, the bench has a spare, geometric profile that reflects the objective perfectionism and rational design approach Florence Knoll learned from her mentor, Mies van der Rohe.

    Finishes

    View Approved KnollTextiles

    See approval matrices in the downloads section for Leather approvals.

    • color Chrome, Polished

    Dimensions

    Additional Info

    Construction and Details
    • Available in a range of KnollTextiles and Spinneybeck® leathers
    • Leather upholstery has matching buttons
    • Seat suspension with No-Sag springs
    • Inner frame is solid wood
    • Exposed metal frame and legs in heavy gauge steel with polished or satin chrome
    • KnollStudio logo and Florence Knoll’s signature are stamped into the base frame

    Configure Florence Knoll Bench

    The configurator below is for reference purposes only. All options, finishes and sizes may not be represented.
    For the complete scope, please refer to the KnollStudio price list.


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    As head of the Knoll Planning unit, Florence Knoll always approached furniture design with the larger space in mind. Most important to her was how a piece fit into the greater design — the room, the floor, the building. Every element of a Knoll-planned space supported the overall design and complemented the existing architecture.

    Never one to compromise, Florence would often design furniture when she, “needed the piece of furniture for a job and it wasn’t there.” And while she never regarded herself as a furniture designer, her quest for harmony of space and consistency of design led her to design several of Knoll’s most iconic pieces—all simple, none plain.

    As skyscrapers rose up across America during the post-war boom, Florence Knoll saw it as her job to translate the vocabulary and rationale of the modern exterior to the interior space of the corporate office. Thus, unlike Saarinen and Bertoia, her designs were architectural in foundation, not sculptural. She scaled down the rhythm and details of modern architecture while humanizing them through color and texture. Her lounge collection, designed in 1954, is a perfect example of her restrained, geometric approach to furniture, clearly derived from her favorite mentor, Mies van der Rohe.

     

    Born to a baker, and orphaned at age twelve, Florence Schust grew up Saginaw, Michigan. Schust demonstrated an early interest in architecture and was enrolled at the Kingswood School for Girls, adjacent to the Cranbrook Academy of Art.

    While at Kingswood, Florence befriended Eilel Saarinen, whom she would later study under at Cranbrook. Warmly embraced by the Saarinen family, Florence seeded in Michigan the foundations of her incredible design education and pioneering career. Florence went on to study under some of the greatest 20th century architects, including Gropius, Breuer, and Mies. In 1941 Florence moved to New York where she met Hans Knoll who was establishing his furniture company. With Florence’s design skills and Hans’ business acumen and salesmanship, the pair, who married in 1946, grew the nascent company into an international arbiter of style and design. In creating the revolutionary Knoll Planning Unit, Florence Knoll defined the standard for the modern corporate interiors of post-war America.

    After the tragic death of Hans Knoll in 1955, Florence Knoll led the company as president through uncertain times. In 1960 she resigned the presidency to focus on directing design and development and, in 1965 after pioneering an industry and defining the landscape and aesthetic of the corporate office, Florence Knoll Bassett (she remarried in 1957) retired from the company. Her contributions to Knoll, and to the rise of modernism in America, are immeasurable.