Charles Pollock 1960
Originally manufactured from 1964-79 and reintroduced in 2014, the steel and leather 'sling chair' or '657', as it is commonly referred to, offers a refined combination of materials and finishes. Tubular steel legs connect to cast-aluminum arms and stretchers with exposed hardware, exemplifying Pollock’'s ‘honest’ approach to design.
Construction and Details
Sling is Spinneybeck Belting Leather
Seat pad is urethane cushion with Spinneybeck Portofino or Hand Tipped leather
Arms and stretchers are cast aluminum with black painted finish
Legs are tubular steel with polished chrome finish
Dimensions:
Width: 25"
Depth: 26"
Height: 27 ¾"
Seat Height: 16 ¼"
Arm Height: 22 ¾"
Pollock describes the chair’s inception:
“I was penniless, didn’t have a car and I was making my prototypes out of plumbing that I pulled out of an old, abandoned basement. I brought all these prototypes in [to Knoll] without an appointment and pushed them off the elevator and said, ‘I want to see Florence Knoll.’ Fortunately for me, [Senior Designer] Vincent Cafiero came out just by accident, and he said, ‘Who are you?’ I said, ‘I’m Charles Pollock.’ I had had a major article in Interiors, in a series of articles about Saarinen, Eames, and myself about three or four months before, and he had read that…. So Cafiero said, “Look, this stuff is interesting. Why don’t you take this idea and throw this other idea into it?” Eventually, between Vincent Cafiero and myself, I developed a quarter-inch scale model of a chair that was very, very similar to…the 657 chair. That was the beginning…. And the rest is history.”
