This "One of 6 in 2010" company ( Fortune 500's "Best Company To Work For"; "Most Admired" and "Most Advanced"), as a further example, boasts several other distinctive awards,including:
In 2008:
- Herman Miller named to Fast Company magazine's "Fast 50" list of the world's most innovative companies.
- The company ranked 26th this year and was the only representative of the contract furniture industry. The "Fast 50" highlights how innovation can drive economic growth.
- Herman Miller achieves placement in the fourth-annual Sustainable Asset Management (SAM) Sustainability Yearbook. It is recognized as SAM Sector Leader and Sector Mover for the Furnishing category.
- Herman Miller receives Best of Michigan Business award from Corp! magazine. Nominated by Corp! readers, it is one of six manufacturers regarded as top in its category.
- Herman Miller is selected to receive a Great Place to Work Award from the Great Place to Work Institute (GPTW). This award recognizes the accomplishments of organizations that have implemented creative and effective approaches to developing trust, pride, and camaraderie within their unique workplaces.
- Herman Miller shares the distinction of Fortune magazine's "Coolest Corporate Headquarters" with Microsoft and S.C. Johnson & Son.
- Herman Miller ranks 96th on Fortune magazine's "100 Best Companies to Work For" list.
What fascinates me, as a student of design and of life in general, is that this seems to be the epitome of the challenge of modern designers. A designer, a design firm, and/or companies that manufacture anything at all that has to do with any given designed product, MUST be concerned with...
1) The design process itself, from inspiration to production, and all the steps in between
2) The engagement of the product, aesthetically, to all the senses
3) The responsibility of the product to be concerned with the environment, not only in production, but in post-production, consumer usage and inevitable disposal of.
...and...
4) The benefits of the product to the consumer's health, lifestyle, and world/society in which they live.
No small task.
Herman Miller was known for his insistence on staffing only the best of the best:
"It was Eames’ way of developing a group of multi-talented designers for his multi-faceted operation."
The Story of Eames, November 18th, 2010, Perrin Drumm
Design solves problems, answers questions, and brings aesthetic pleasure.
The part I find most fascinating of the Eames chair process is the longevity and classicism that the chair has maintained since it's innovation in 1956.
The Herman Miller company has manufactured millions of chairs in different fabrications and material handlings since then, but the Eames chair, Miller's collaborative design with internationally-known Ray and Charles Eames, holds my personal interest and affection.
Perhaps it is that my earliest memories of the Eames chair that give way to nostalgic fondness: citrus orange, sunshiney yellow, groovy aqua and avocado green colors....curvilinear lines and plastic seating molded to the curves of one's "bottom", making them so much fun to sit in; shiney chrome legs that cross-cross eachother in a balanced and symetrical fashion.
Detailings that were not only popular for that era, but remain popular today with this generation of design enthusiatists who are looking to the past to make what once was, now IS, again.
A classic Eames 1956 chair and ottoman set, in it's vintage authentic state, can be bought for $6,900.00, if you so desire....
http://www.rubylane.com/item/201779-TF2285500/Original-1956-Eames-Chair-Ottoman
Made as simple as possible, with the bare minimalism that resurfaces in design over and over again, the "Chair" of all chairs asks the question "Which came first? The Function or the Form?"
Eames himself said, “If it isn’t functional, it isn’t beautiful.”
The Eames chair is BOTH , and an inspiration to designers today.
In fact, recently in the news, 20 of the most celebrated grafitti and street artist took on the challenge of using the iconic chair and make it over with their own unique vision and flavor. The end result being that these chairs would then be sold on eBay. These chairs, on display at Barney's in New York, showcase the marked individuality and distinct creativity and have a minimum starting bid of $1000.00.
Funds raised will benefit New York public schools. Operation Design, a non-profit group of designers and architects, teamed up with students from one such school to work with them and give them a hands-on experience. In turn, students have the ownership of choosing colors, materials and imagination in re-inventing their schools. This gives the students a rare opprotunity to learn from professional desigers and architects whichallows them experience firsthand what it takes, from start to finish, to be inspired, formulate ideas, reshape the ideas into a working and functional form, and then watch them come to life.
From the Miller/Eames inspiration to create a chair...to the inspiration to use this chair and become re-invented by current atists - reinterpreted for the "now"....to the inspiration of students that can see the passion of working artists, designers and architects gift them with their talents and experience....again and again, the process coming full circle....THAT, my friends, is what I call true design.
The yellow molded plastic chair with the eiffel base you've posted is a bad knock off.
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