Penelope Chair by Charles Pollock for Castelli

Industrial designer Charles Pollock was born in 1930 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At the age of sixteen, he began working at the Chrysler Corporation, creating visual aids and gaining production experience. Pollock received a full scholarship to study industrial design at the School of Art & Design at Pratt Institute in New York. During a tour of Pratt, industrial designer George Nelson (1908-86) admired Pollock’s work and became a mentoring figure through much of Pollock’s career. 

After graduating, Pollock was drafted into the army and became the art director of Infantry Magazine. Upon returning to New York, Pollock began working for Nelson at Herman Miller. Together they experimented with swaging—a technique that Pollock developed at Pratt—which involved using pressure to curve and taper metal tubes. Uniquely splayed tubular steel legs became the focal point of their ten-piece Swag Leg Collection (1958).

Pollock opened his own studio in 1960, and soon after Florence Knoll (b. 1917) of the eponymous manufacturing company took an interest in his designs. With the financial support of Knoll, Pollock became heavily involved in product development. His designs for Knoll include the 657 Sling Chair (1960) and the ergonomic Pollock Chair (1963)—which was held together by a single aluminum band and remains the most successful executive chair to date that is still in production. With Florence Knoll’s retirement in 1965, Pollock relocated to Europe where he went on to design the ergonomic Penelope Chair for Castelli (1982). After a long hiatus, at the age of 82, Pollock debuted the CP Lounge Collection for Bernhardt Design. This was his first product released in America since his Pollock Chair forty-seven years prior.  

Often overlooked in comparison to his contemporaries, Pollock was a quiet force driving the midcentury design movement. His work has been exhibited in many museum exhibitions around the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Louvre in Paris.

Pollock died in 2013 at the age of 83 in New York.

Italian design company Castelli began dates from 1877 when Ettore Castelli founded a small workshop in Bologna. In 1939, the firm was renamed Anonima Castelli and began producing modern office furniture for which the brand is best known on the vintage market. It is recognized as one of the foremost manufacturers of Italian design of the 20th century and as the producer of the iconic Plia Chair.

In the 1960s, Giancarlo Piretti (born in Bologna in 1940) joined Castelli as an interior designer. During his twelve years at Castelli, Piretti obtained numerous industrial patents and designed many now iconic models, primarily in seating design. Piretti was instrumental in establishing Castelli’s  international reputation, being the creator of the brand’s most successful and well known designs. Undoubtedly a design classic, Piretti’s plastic folding Plia Chair (1968) was exhibited at the Fiera del Mobile fair in Milan in 1967. The chair, which has sold over four million units since 1969, won the BIO 5 award at the Ljubljana Biennial in 1971, Germany’s Gute Form prize in 1973 and can be found in permanent collections of museums in Austria, Czech Republic, Slovenia, and the United States.

Piretti’s most famous designs for Castelli include the DCS 106 Stacking Chair (1965), Plona Lounge Chair (1969), Alky Chair (c. 1970), Plantone Folding Desk (1970), Plano (1971, Gold Medal IBD), Planto Coat Rack (1972), and the modular System 61 Sofa (1973)

In the late-1970s, Piretti worked with Argentinian architect-designer Emilio Ambasz (b. 1943), and the pair created the two ergonomic seating systems Vertebra (1979, winner of the Smau Industrial Design Award) and Dorsal (1981) for Castelli.

Although Castelli’s legacy is often defined by its partnership with Piretti, the brand has produced work by many other talented designers including Claudio Bellini, Rodolfo Bonetto, Michele De Lucchi, Hans Ell, Doriana and Massimiliano Fuksas, Gino Gamberini, Nilo Gioacchini, Enzo Mari, Charles Pollock, F.A. Porsche, Mario Ruiz, and Richard Sapper. Important designs include Sapper’s Nine to Five Desk (1986, winner of a Compasso d’Oro); Pollock’s Penelope Chair (1982); Porsche’s Executive Office Series (1989); and Ruiz’ K22 Program (2005).

Castelli received four Compasso d’Oro Awards between 1981 and 1991.

In 1992, Castelli became part of the Haworth Group. Today, Castelli specializes in producing environmentally friendly and sustainable products.