Vaasi pendant

Interior designer, honorary professor, born 1932

Eero Aarnio is one of the great innovators of modern furniture design, not only in Finland but worldwide. The hallmarks of Aarnio’s designs are playful and ingeniously simplified shapes, materials and vibrant colours. In addition, his designs invariably succeed in offering economically sustainable solutions for both the users of the objects and its manufacture. Aarnio became renowned in the 1960s for his Bubble and Pastil chairs, which were designed from fibreglass and have been in continuous production ever since. Aarnio produces several stylish new interior items every year, as well as including furniture, luminaires and textiles.

Aarnio has said that plastic is a material he is particularly fond of, because it is as malleable and multi-faceted as his own imagination. Aarnio compares his design process to putting together a jigsaw puzzle. At first there always seems to be too many pieces to choose from, but before long things start to become coherent, and little by little the pieces fit logically into place. Aarnio has received many significant awards throughout his long and distinguished career, including the International Design Award of the American Industrial Design Award (New York 1968) for his Pastil chair, the Finland Prize of the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture in 2005, the Italian ADI Compasso d'Oro Award for industrial design in 2008 for the Trioli chair designed for Magis, and the Pro Finlandia Medal in 2010. Many of Aarnio’s works are on permanent display in several prestigious museums around the world, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany.