Fun Furniture Fact

Furniture Fact #10:

Charles Pollock, was an essential, but almost secret, player in the Mid Century industrial design movement. In 1963, he introduced the Pollock Executive Chair through Knoll Studio. It remains an office fixture to this day, making high-profile appearances on Mad Men and in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. — Fast Company

Charles Pollock’s Executive Chair utilizes what Pollock, himself, described as “rim technology”:— the use of a single polished aluminum band around the chair’’s perimeter to hold the design together, structurally and visually. Fifty years after its introduction, the Pollock Chair continues to exude timeless elegance.

These chairs continue to be sold on the Knoll website and retail for $2070!

Purchase the 1980s version of the Pollock Executive chair on our site for just $813!

Features: 5-star design base, 360 degrees swiveling base, button-tufted leather upholstery, and seamless plastic armrests.

Furniture Fact #8:

Known for his daring designs which brought high style to the masses, [Adrian Pearsall] is credited with the creation of long and low gondola sofas, free-form walnut and glass tables, and the popularization of the venerable bean bag chair. – Obituary, adrianpearsall.com

Adrian Mount Pearsall (1925-2011) was an innovative designer who founded Craft Associates, which became one of the country’s most prominent furniture designers during the mid-century “Atomic Age.” He went on to be included in the American Furniture Hall of Fame in 2008.

There have been some issues surrounding his designs, regarding inauthentic reproductions and copies. His family is working hard to discredit the individuals and companies that are making these false claims.

Read more about his life and legacy here.

Like his stuff? Take a look at the Daybed Sofas styled after his designs that are residing in the FG showroom right now! As for the authenticity of these sofas, we are not sure whether they are or are not authentic Adrian Pearsall designs.

The ‘barrister bookcase’ is a special storage piece that enters the Furnish Green showroom every once in a blue moon. It is well-loved and sought after because of its unique and very functional construction. While we at Furnish Green love these pieces as much as the next guy, we didn’t necessarily know the story behind their interesting shelf structure. Here’s what we found:

A barrister is a member of one of the classes of lawyers found in many common law jurisdictions with split legal professions. They require the use of many law books and may frequently move to new chambers. As a result, a specialized form of portable bookcase was developed to meet their needs.

A barrister’s bookcase consists of several separate shelf units that may be stacked together to form a cabinet. When moving chambers, each shelf is carried separately without needing to remove its contents and becomes a carrying-case full of books. As the shelves  are meant to be separated, an “up and over” door mechanism is used on each shelf, allowing the individual doors to pull up and slide in to display the contents.

Each shelf of a true barrister’s bookcase must be portable with a heavy load of books. The more robust examples have folding handles at the ends of each shelf. Modern “decorator” copies of these may look the same, but are often too lightly constructed to be carried while loaded, or may even be a single fixed case like a normal bookcase, but with separate doors on each shelf to give the appearance of a barrister’s bookcase.

Recently in the showroom (it has since sold) we had an industrial version of the classic Barrister. Check it out.