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Featured Designer
Florence Knoll
In creating the revolutionary Knoll Planning Unit, Florence Knoll defined the standard for the modern corporate interiors of post-war America. Drawing on her background in architecture, she introduced modern notions of efficiency, space planning, and comprehensive design to office planning projects. Florence ardently maintained that she did not merely decorate space—she created it.
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Featured Designer
Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe
Regarded as one of the most important figures in the history of architecture, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s ‘less-is-more’ approach to design was the gold standard for many generations of modern architecture. His legendary career started humbly at his father’s stonemasonry business, giving him an early appreciation of material and structure. From there he apprenticed with furniture designer Bruno Paul in Berlin before joining the office of Peter Behrens, an architect and painter at the forefront of the modern movement.
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Featured Designer
David Adjaye
Sir David Adjaye OBE is recognized as a leading architect of his generation. Adjaye was born in Tanzania to Ghanaian parents and his influences range from contemporary art, music and science to African art forms and the civic life of cities. In 1994 he set up his first office, where his ingenious use of materials and his sculptural ability established him as an architect with an artist’s sensibility and vision.
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Featured Designer
Antenna Design
Antenna Design was founded in 1997 by Masamichi Udagawa, a Cranbrook Acadamy graduate, and Sigi Moeslinger, who holds degrees from NYU and Art Center College of Design. Antenna's people-centered design approach aims to make the experience of objects and environments more meaningful and exciting. Among Antenna’s best known projects are the design of New York City Subway cars and ticket vending machines, JetBlue check-in kiosks and displays for Bloomberg.
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Featured Designer
Eero Saarinen
Born to world famous architect and Cranbrook Academy of Art director Eliel Saarinen and textile artist Loja Saarinen, Eero Saarinen was surrounded by design his whole life. Eero was helping his father design furniture and fixtures for the Cranbrook campus by the time he was in his teens. After studying sculpture in Paris and architecture at Yale, Saarinen returned in 1934 to Michigan to teach at Cranbrook, work on furniture designs, and practice architecture with his father. It was at Cranbrook that Saarinen met Charles Eames and Florence Schust.
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Featured Designer
Harry Bertoia
Harry Bertoia was a complete and gifted artist. After studying at the Detroit Technical High School and the Detroit School of Arts and Crafts, Harry Bertoia opened his own metal workshop at Cranbrook where he taught jewelry design and metal work. In 1946 he moved to California to help fellow Cranbrook alumnus Charles Eames develop methods of laminating and bending plywood. Bertoia’s iconic wire furniture collection, introduced in 1952, is recognized worldwide as one of the great achievements of 20th century furniture design.
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Featured Designer
Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby
Internationally acclaimed designers Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby founded their studio in 1996 after graduating with Master’s degrees in Architecture from The Royal College of Art in London. Alongside their eponymous studio, in 2001 Barber and Osgerby founded Universal Design Studio, now recognized as one of the world’s most innovative creative design consultancies working in architecture, interiors and exhibition design.
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