Steelcase, Frank Lloyd Wright Launch Furniture Series
How can a global leader in commercial furniture and an American architect of international repute launch a new series years after said architect’s passing? The answer goes back to 1938, to a notable end user inviting Steelcase to make a building’s worth of furniture from a few scribbles on scrap paper by their architect. Sound unlikely? Not when the architect was Frank Lloyd Wright, the client was SC Johnson, and the client’s project was a new headquarters building in Racine, Wisconsin. When Steelcase’s David Hunting, then the firm’s president, met with SC Johnson representatives and Mr. Wright about the furniture, he initially received neither drawings nor plans. Mr. Hunting left with Mr. Wright’s “definite ideas” about what he wanted, and his impromptu sketches on scrap paper. As a closing comment to their meeting, the architect said, “This is about what I’d like.” Mr. Hunting’s remarks come from “Frank Lloyd Wright …
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