Skip Navigation

"Sof-Tech" Side Chair

Decorative Arts and Design

On View: Luce Visible Storage and Study Center, 5th Floor
MEDIUM Tubular steel, PVC coated steel
  • Place Manufactured: York, Pennsylvania, United States
  • DATES Designed 1979
    DIMENSIONS 29 3/4 x 19 3/4 x 16 7/8 in. (75.6 x 50.2 x 42.9 cm) Seat Height: 16 7/8 in. (42.9 cm)  (show scale)
    MARKINGS On paper label attached to underside of seat frame: "A David Rowland design for Thonet / Patents Pending"
    SIGNATURE no signature
    INSCRIPTIONS no inscriptions
    ACCESSION NUMBER 84.33.1
    CREDIT LINE Gift of Thonet
    CATALOGUE DESCRIPTION Tubular chrome-plated steel frame with plastic-coated gridded sheet for seat and back. Frame composed of a pair of straight stiles, curving back slightly at the top, and a single length of steel running from the foot of both legs, around the sides and back of the seat. The seat and back are each composed of a length of plastic-covered ("Soflex") grid (with rounded lines), arching slightly upward from side to side. CONDITION: Good, but obviously used. Chrome-plating is flaking off at inside edge of proper right stile where it joins back. A few, slight nicks to frame: towards front proper left of seat frame, proper right leg at front right top. Piece of bottom. Seat no longer shiny, due to use.
    MUSEUM LOCATION This item is on view in Luce Visible Storage and Study Center, 5th Floor
    CAPTION David Rowland (American, born 1924). "Sof-Tech" Side Chair, Designed 1979. Tubular steel, PVC coated steel, 29 3/4 x 19 3/4 x 16 7/8 in. (75.6 x 50.2 x 42.9 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Thonet, 84.33.1. Creative Commons-BY (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 84.33.1_bw.jpg)
    IMAGE overall, 84.33.1_bw.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph
    "CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
    RIGHTS STATEMENT Creative Commons-BY
    You may download and use Brooklyn Museum images of this three-dimensional work in accordance with a Creative Commons license. Fair use, as understood under the United States Copyright Act, may also apply. Please include caption information from this page and credit the Brooklyn Museum. If you need a high resolution file, please fill out our online application form (charges apply). For further information about copyright, we recommend resources at the United States Library of Congress, Cornell University, Copyright and Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums, and Copyright Watch. For more information about the Museum's rights project, including how rights types are assigned, please see our blog posts on copyright. If you have any information regarding this work and rights to it, please contact copyright@brooklynmuseum.org.
    RECORD COMPLETENESS
    Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.