Lot: 256

Ilkka Suppanen
Unique 'Nomad' prototype armchair , 1994 (design and execution)

H. 92 x 71 x 65 cm.
Metal tube, strip metal, painted silver-grey, metal rods, black, white felt cover, brass. Marked: Designer's signature, 1994.

This chair is the prototype of the 'Nomad' chair. It was constructed and assembled by the designer himself and given as a gift to photographer and good friend Tom Vack. The chair was only produced many years after the initial design, in a very small edition of 25 copies, by the Maria Wettergren Gallery in Paris. No other copies exist. "The Nomad Chair is, without a doubt, one of the most important designs of my career. I began working on it in 1993 as a student at the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, despite being told that such a design was impossible. Driven by a desire to prove myself, I crafted every prototype by hand in the academy’s workshop, determined to bring this unique concept to life. The piece here was one I personally made during this period.

The chair debuted as part of the "Varde The Nordic Design Programme" student exhibition in 1994/95, traveling to cities including London, Rome, Berlin, Vienna, and Budapest. It received widespread acclaim during the iconic Snowcrash exhibition at Milan Design Week in 1997, establishing itself as a landmark piece. Since then, the Nomad Chair has been celebrated in exhibitions worldwide and featured in design publications, including Finnish Modern Design: Utopian Ideals and Everyday Realities, 1930–1997, edited by Marianne Aav and Nina Stritzler-Levine. Recognized wherever I go, it now resides in the permanent collections of the Helsinki Design Museum and the Museum of Applied Arts in Cologne (MAKK)." Ilkka Suppanen

Hammer Price: 6,000 €