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Elda Armchair
Iconic Designs

Elda ArmchairBy Joe Colombo

About the Design

With its bulbous fiberglass shell and plush leather cushions, the Elda chair looks as if it belongs on a big-budget 1970s-era film set. That’s just where you’ll find it — the piece made its feature-film debut in the 1977 James Bond movie The Spy Who Loved Me. The chair was created by Cesare "Joe" Colombo (1930–71), an Italian artist-turned-industrial-designer known for his retro-futuristic works. Colombo started his career as an artist, studying painting at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan before he went on to study architecture at the Polytechnic University. Throughout the 1950s, Colombo found a home within the Abstract Expressionist movement, creating paintings and sculptures that were exhibited throughout Europe.

Colombo’s focus shifted to design when he took over his family business, an electrical appliance manufacturing company, where he experimented with industrial production techniques. In 1962, he opened his own architecture and design firm. With a focus on futuristic living systems inspired by the technological advances of the space race, Colombo created everything from air-conditioning units to dinnerware to furniture, most famously the 1963 Elda chair.

Named after Colombo’s wife, the Elda chair was designed to wholly surround its sitter, as if it were hugging them. The designer envisioned the chair to be a place of comfort in the home from which you could use digital technology to connect with the world — as it turns out, Colombo had impressive foresight. A year following his death, Colombo’s design work was included in the 1972 exhibition “Italy: The New Domestic Landscape” at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

Elda Armchair

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In 1964, Joe Colombo designed the Elda fibreglass armchair for Comfort - it has been produced unchanged in Italy ever since. We have currently Elda chairs in stock. They are immediately available. They come with original certificate and box. Elda was the first armchair to have a self-supporting plastic frame. That's why the design classic can be found in many important design collections such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York or the Louvre in Paris. Elda is rotatable thanks to an integrated ball bearing, seven sausage-like leather upholstered cushions ensure maximum seating comfort. The fibreglass shell is optionally available in white or black, the typical sausage-like leather upholstery as standard in seven different leather colours. Joe Colombo was one of the most innovative designers of the 1960s. His designs were based on the theory that conventional furniture would soon be over - a thought that Le Corbusier also had. He consistently implemented his visions in many furniture and lighting designs or in 1969 during the Visiona exhibition of Bayer AG...
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