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Designer Jonathan Olivares is working wonders at Knoll

-  PEI-RU KEH

When the industrial designer Jonathan Olivares was appointed senior vice president of design at US furniture company Knoll last June, it felt like the turning of a tide. As an originator of American design since its founding in 1938 by Hans and Florence Knoll, with icons such as Marcel Breuer’s ‘Wassily’ chair (1925) and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich’s ‘Barcelona’ chair (1929) both under trademarks in its control, the once-pioneering company had endured several years of uncertainty, including being acquired by Herman Miller for an epic $1.8bn in 2021, and keeping a relatively low profile before that.

The shake-up (and wake-up) that Knoll supporters have been waiting for appears to have arrived with Olivares’ appointment. As a custodian of Knoll’s design legacy, Olivares has been tasked with overseeing future Knoll designs, which he plans to do with a community of international designers. And it all comes to fruition for the first time this month at Salone del Mobile. With a pavilion designed by Belgian architecture firm Office KGDVS, a new outdoor collection by Piero Lissoni, a reissue of Eero Saarinen’s iconic round table in a new size, and a host of other renewals of classic products, including the 1966 Collection by Richard Schultz, Knoll’s presence in Milan is set to be about moving forward as much as it is about looking back.