CategoriesFurniture and Lighting
Sofa
A long upholstered seat for two or more people, from French canapés and buttoned Chesterfields to foam-filled and modular modern designs.
2 works · 10 related artists
About
A sofa is only as good as its upholstery, and its history follows changes in padding. Eighteenth-century French canapés and English settees were carved frames with stuffed seats, built for upright sitting in formal rooms. Coil springs, used widely in the 19th century, allowed deep, buttoned forms such as the Chesterfield, and the parlour sofa became a household centrepiece.
Foam rubber transformed the shape again after the Second World War. The Italian firm Arflex, founded with backing from the tyre maker Pirelli, used it to make light, curvy seating. Finn Juhl's compact Poet sofa (1941) paired a soft back with sculpted wood, Mario Bellini's Camaleonda (1970) broke the sofa into modules that could be rearranged, and Oscar Niemeyer brought his architecture's curves to low seating. Look at proportions, the tightness of the upholstery and what lies beneath it, from horsehair to foam.
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