The acquisition of Knoll by Herman Miller was announced in April 2021 in a $1.8 billion deal. The merger closed in the third quarter of 2021.[8] The merged company is listed on the
Nasdaq Stock Market and trades under the symbol MLKN.
Some of the company's products are included in museum collections, such as the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, the
Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art.[15][16]
In 1948, Eero Saarinen designed the womb chair.[17]
In 1956, the company commissioned Eero Saarinen to design the
Tulip chair for production.[18]
Following the production of the tulip chair, the tulip table was designed by Saarinen.
In 1953, the company was accorded exclusive manufacturing and sales rights to Ludwig Mies van der Rohe furniture, including the
Barcelona chair, which was designed in collaboration with
Lilly Reich for the 1929
Barcelona Pavilion.
[1]
In 1947, Knoll acquired exclusive U.S. production rights of the
Hardoy chair("Butterfly chair") by Jorge Ferrari-Hardoy. Cheaper imitations of the chair were also sold. Knoll took legal action in 1950, eventually losing its claim of
copyright infringement; the model was dropped in 1951.[19][20] In 2018, Knoll released a 100th anniversary tribute to the Butterfly Chair.[21]
Knoll sponsors exhibitions, scholarships, and other activities related to
modernist architecture and design. In 2006, Knoll and the
World Monuments Fund, a New York-based non-profit organization, launched Modernism at Risk, an advocacy and conservation program. Modernism at Risk encourages design solutions for at-risk modernist buildings, provides funding for conservation projects, and raises awareness of threats to Modernist architecture through exhibitions and lectures.
The World Monuments Fund (also known as the Knoll Modernism Prize) is awarded to projects that preserve Modernist architecture every two years.
In 2008, the first Knoll Modernism award was given to Winfried Brenne and Franz Jaschke of the
German firm Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten for the restoration of the former
ADGB Trade Union School building on the outskirts of
Berlin. The school, built between 1928 and 1930, was a project of the
Bauhaus design school. Its architects were
Hannes Meyer, then director of the Bauhaus, and
Hans Wittwer.[22]
The 2010 prize went to
Hubert-Jan Henket and Wessel de Jonge, the founders of
Docomomo International, for the restoration of
Zonnestraal Sanatorium (estate) in
Hilversum in the Netherlands.[23] The 2012 prize was given to a consortium of Japanese architects and academics for the restoration of Hizuchi Elementary School, which was built in the 1950s, on
Shikoku Island, Japan.[24]
^Tribune, Mary Beth Klatt, Special to the.
"FLOAT LIKE A BUTTERFLY". chicagotribune.com. Retrieved 2021-09-10.{{
cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (
link)
McAtee, Cammie; Floré, Fredie (2017). "Knolling Paris: from the "new look" to Knoll au Louvre". In Floré, Fredie; McAtee, Cammie (eds.). The Politics of Furniture: Identity, Diplomacy and Persuasion in Post-War Interiors. Taylor & Francis.
ISBN9781317020479.