Modesty and Beauty: The Ball Chair
It is said that naturalness is beauty within itself. If it were true, one evidence to it would be the Ball Chair.
Also popular as the Globe Chair, the Ball Chair is a chair designed by distinguished Finnish furniture designer Eero Aarnio in 1966. As its name siuggests, the Ball Chair is based on a very simple geometric form – the Earth. Essentially, the chair is created of a ball cut near the middle, hollowed out and fixed with a base at the bottom, creating a general shape not displayed in most chair designs.
Because of its unique design, the Ball Chair has had a great number of descriptions associated to its name. The chair was said to exceed the feeling of a “room within a room” as its spherical design allowed for a peaceful and comfortable atmosphere, muted outside noises and supplied the person sitting inside the feeling of seclusion. The Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany has also regarded that the chair is “something between a piece of furniture and a piece of architecture and at the same time represents both the mobile and the established”.
According to Eero Aarnio, its author, the concept of the Ball Chair first surfaced when Aarnio started his freelance career in 1962. With his home without a proper big chair, Aarnio concluded to design a new one. After a few sketches the concept progressed into the familiar ball shape, and Aarnio created the first prototype himself with an inside mould. The standard of the concoction process was similar to that of a glider fuselage or wing, and the plywood body mould was protected with damp paper and laminated with fiberglass. Upholstery and a leg were added to the chair, and a red telephone was built as well. After it was done, Aarnio gave the chair its now-famous (and noticeable) name of Ball Chair and is still standing in Eero’s house to this day.
After it was manufactured, the Ball Chair was seen by two managers from the appliance company Asko while visiting Aarnio and they were instantly impressed of the design. Then in 1966 the Ball Chair was promoted at an international furniture fair in Cologne, Germany, where it became an urgent sensation and started Eero Aarnio’s break in the international furniture design arena.
The Ball Chair has also received popularity from the sci-fi movie Men in Black. In the film, a variation of the Ball Chair was mobilized as furniture in the examination room where one of the heroes, Will Smith, was attaining a test.
