A Taxonomy of Office Chairs

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A Taxonomy of Office Chairs
A Taxonomy of Office Chairs (Book Cover).jpeg
Author Jonathan Olivares
LanguageEnglish
SubjectFurniture design and manufacture
GenreNon-fiction
Published2011
Publisher Phaidon Press
Pages240
ISBN 978-0-7148-6103-6
OCLC 681495449
Centripetal Spring office chair designed by Thomas E. Warren for the American Chair Company (c. 1849) Wolfsonian-FIU Museum - IMG 8180.JPG
Centripetal Spring office chair designed by Thomas E. Warren for the American Chair Company (c. 1849)

A Taxonomy of Office Chairs is a 2011 book by Jonathan Olivares. It is a scholarly work that applies scientific methods primarily associated with Linnaean classification of biological taxa to a specific furniture typology. According to the Los Angeles Review of Books , it is "a serious attempt to visualize the evolutionary breakthroughs and mutations often taken for granted when considering the various industrialized objects that 'make up our predominant reality.'" [2]

Contents

Description

A Taxonomy of Office Chairs examines and analyses over 130 of the "most innovative" examples of the titular typology, spanning from familiar mid-century modern classics like the Eames Aluminium Group to the Aeron chair, the "gold standard" archetype of 1990s ergonomic seating, [3] together with more obscure but no less influential designs dating from the mid-19th to the early 21st century. [4] [5] Iconic pieces conceived by well known architects and designers including Marcel Breuer, Charles and Ray Eames, Richard Sapper, and Frank Lloyd Wright [6] are considered alongside lesser known designs such as early cast iron Centripetal Spring office chairs, Emilio Ambasz's Vertebra chairs, and Peter Opsvik's "anti-chairs" [7] – as well as Darwin's own contribution to the evolution of the typology through the addition of a wheeled metal base to an upholstered armchair in order to facilitate gliding from one specimen to another in his Kent study. [8] [9] [10]

Patent drawing for an Eames Aluminum Group chair designed by Charles and Ray Eames, and Don Albinson (1958) US3041109 Sheet 1 of 3 (cropped).png
Patent drawing for an Eames Aluminum Group chair designed by Charles and Ray Eames, and Don Albinson (1958)

Referencing archival documents like patent drawings for new functionalities, innovative engineering solutions and mechanisms, and specific manufacturing methods, while employing "an encyclopedic point of reference" and detailed taxonomic hierarchies of individual traits, the book presents exhaustive diagrams of each example, methodically categorised by section (e.g., armrest, base, stem) in order to identify and catalogue characteristics and variations such as height, articulation, material, as well as structural and aesthetic considerations. [6] [4]

The work began as an in-house research project initially commissioned by Benjamin Pardo, [13] [14] Olivares's predecessor as design director of Knoll. [6] [15] [16] After over four years of in-depth research and study, it evolved into its final form and was published by Phaidon Press in May 2011. [17] [18]

Reception and influence

Writing for the New York Times, design critic Alice Rawsthorn noted that Olivares's "unusually thoughtful and rigorous" taxonomic method of approaching the subject "distinguishes his book from the usual run of image-heavy, fact-lite coffee table-crushing design tomes." She went on to say, "You’ll never look at an office chair in quite the same way again." [15] In a similar vein, Metropolis described it as "an invaluable reference work for industrial-design buffs and a rejection of the coffee-table-book format all too common in the industry." [19]

Prospect magazine called the book an "Origin of Species for Aeron freaks" and compared it to Alain de Botton’s The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work – ultimately dismissing it as "the kind of repetitive, extravagantly pointless task with which the corporate world has made us all familiar". [20]

A Taxonomy of Office Chairs was shortlisted for the 2012 Diagram Prize, an annual literary award given to a book with an odd or unusual title. [21]

Ten years after publication of the original book, Olivares released a small companion work called A Taxonomy of Office Chairs: Outtakes, Scraps and Updates. [22] This corollary compendium looks at the research processes and techniques that were applied to making the initial work, adds updated material relevant to developments of the intervening decade, and shares personal points of view that were not suitable in the context of the original work. In the author's words, the addendum is intended as "a subjective scrapbook that is more in line with how I look at things today." [22]

Key examples

See also

References

  1. ↑ Olivares, Jonathan (2011). A Taxonomy of Office Chairs. Phaidon Press. p. 29. ISBN   978-0-7148-6103-6.
  2. ↑ "All Hail the Chairmen: Jonathan Olivares's "Taxonomy of Office Chairs"". Los Angeles Review of Books . 18 April 2012. Retrieved 22 October 2025.
  3. 1 2 Chadwick, Donald T.; Stumpf, William (1994), "Aeron Office Chair", Museum of Modern Art , retrieved 11 January 2026
  4. 1 2 "Events > A Taxonomy of Office Chairs". Graham Foundation . 14 June 2011. Retrieved 20 December 2025.
  5. ↑ "Iconic Office Chairs". Red Dot Design Award . Retrieved 14 January 2026.
  6. 1 2 3 Blinn, Robert (14 June 2011). "Book Review: A Taxonomy of Office Chairs, by Jonathan Olivares". Core77 . Retrieved 22 October 2025.
  7. ↑ Alexa, Alexandra. "Several Seats: The Chairs of Peter Opsvik". Pin-Up . Retrieved 18 January 2026.
  8. 1 2 deLongchamps, Kya (19 February 2022). "Vintage View: How Charles Darwin led the way in the evolution of the office chair". Irish Examiner . Retrieved 5 January 2026.
  9. ↑ Zabalbeascoa, Anatxu (12 September 2011). "Charles Darwin, inventor de sillas" [Charles Darwin, inventor of chairs]. El País (in Spanish). ISSN   1134-6582. Archived from the original on 5 January 2026. Retrieved 5 January 2026.
  10. ↑ Murphy, Heather (30 May 2012). "Why We Still Haven't Found the Perfect Office Chair". Slate Magazine . Retrieved 5 January 2026.
  11. ↑ US 3041109, Eames, Charles & Albinson, Don,"Web and spreader furniture construction",issued 26 June 1962
  12. ↑ Eames, Ray; Eames, Charles; Albinson, Don (1958), Aluminium Group, model 682, Victoria and Albert Museum , retrieved 17 January 2026
  13. ↑ Lange, Alexandra (19 September 2012). "A chair for all Seasons". Domus . Retrieved 10 January 2026.
  14. ↑ Heller, Steven; Olivares, Jonathan (29 November 2012). "'Comfort Is Largely a Social Construct': The Unsettled Design Ethos of the Chair". The Atlantic . Archived from the original on 12 Jul 2024. Retrieved 29 December 2025.
  15. 1 2 Rawsthorn, Alice (24 April 2011). "Taking a Zoological Approach to Chairs (Published 2011)". The New York Times . Archived from the original on 11 December 2021. Retrieved 22 October 2025.
  16. ↑ "Design Deconstructed: The Olivares Aluminum Chair". Knoll . Retrieved 11 January 2026.
  17. ↑ Day, Karen (29 April 2011). "A Taxonomy of Office Chairs". Cool Hunting. Retrieved 22 October 2025.
  18. ↑ Laliberte, Kristian (13 May 2011). "Phaidon's New Book, A Taxonomy Of Office Chairs, Features 130 Of The Coolest Office Chairs". Refinery29 . Retrieved 17 January 2026.
  19. ↑ Currey, Mason (1 June 2011). "Not Another Coffee-Table Book". Metropolis . Retrieved 20 January 2026.
  20. 1 2 Aspden, Rachel (20 April 2011). "Specious odyssey". Prospect . Retrieved 20 January 2026.
  21. ↑ "Cooking with Poo wins Diagram Prize for oddest title". BBC News . 30 March 2012. Retrieved 15 January 2026.
  22. 1 2 "A Taxonomy of Office Chairs". Donati. Retrieved 3 November 2025.
  23. ↑ US 168482, Hale, Henry S.,"Improvement in tilting chairs",issued 5 October 1875
  24. ↑ "Artist Profile: Frank Lloyd Wright". National Gallery of Victoria . Retrieved 13 January 2026.
  25. ↑ "Untitled / Office chair for the Larkin Administration Building, 1906". Vitra Design Museum . Retrieved 4 January 2026.
  26. ↑ "The world's most modern office". Domus . Retrieved 13 January 2026.
  27. ↑ "Desk and chair designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, 1936-39". V&A Americas Foundation. Retrieved 13 January 2026.
  28. ↑ Ambasz, Emilio; Piretti, Giancarlo. "'Vertebra' Armchair". Metropolitan Museum of Art . Retrieved 11 January 2026.
  29. ↑ Nelson, Tim (23 February 2018). "How This Chair Could Change Office Design as We Know it". Architectural Digest . Archived from the original on 19 Jul 2021. Retrieved 20 January 2026.
  30. ↑ Chadwick, Donald T.; Stumpf, William (2017), "Aeron 'Live OS' chair", Victoria and Albert Museum , retrieved 17 January 2026

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