Charlotte Perriand
b.1903–1999, France
b.1903–1999, France
BIOGRAPHY
Charlotte Perriand was a rare female
voice among the avant-garde designers whose designs shaped modern living in the
early 20th century. As a student, she rejected the popular Beaux-Arts style and
found inspiration instead in machine-age technology. She joined the studio of Le Corbusierat 24, where she experimented with steel, aluminum, and glass, developing a
series of tubular steel chairs that remain a modern icon. In 1940, she traveled
to Japan to advise the government on how to export products to the West, and
spent WWII exiled in Vietnam, where she discovered local woodwork and weaving
techniques and embraced natural materials. “The most important thing to realize
is that what drives the modern movement is a spirit of enquiry; it’s a process
of analysis and not a style,” she said near the end of her life. “We worked
with ideals.”
SELECTED WORKS
— Available Works
