So what's new? I remember working for major investment bank over ten years ago with no Ive around and more fashionable and modern mesh type advanced frame chairs and they already cost exactly this price tag. We are talking over ten years ago and it was for every consultant and amployee in the building! Why is this is news and so important today about Apple?
A big success for Barber Osgerby and for British design as a brand.
For those not in the world of design it may not be obvious how significant this kind of thing is. And lets face it for most people a chair is a horizontal buttock support and not a lot more.
a) If you design for Vitra you are ALREADY in the company of Charles Eames.
b) A big buy like this and the seal of approval from Ive is the next step on the road to design canonisation.
c) For a designer, to have a classic chair in their portfolio is a bit like getting an Oscar. I've worked with a few really good designers in my day who are at this kind of level and one of them, for a hobby collected miniature models of these chairs and paid a significant portion of the price of an actual chair for the models.
Having said all that, my Aeron exec with shiny Chrome beats any other chair I've used and is specced for my just-sub NFL player sized bones, something I can't get with most office chairs.
Having said all that, my Aeron exec with shiny Chrome beats any other chair I've used and is specced for my just-sub NFL player sized bones, something I can't get with most office chairs.
A note: be careful not to sit regularly on the front edge/frame of your chair if you are a big guy. We had Aerons all over our facility and one dude who was a bit jumbo sized actually broke the front frame piece sitting on the edge of it. It made a really loud popping sound and actually shot some sparks from the fracture point. Probably not real burning sparks but a large static discharge type of thing. Since the chair had a 12 year warranty, Herman Miller sent a guy out to replace the broken part for free. The guy who broke it asked for a different type of chair that was designed for heavy people. I obliged.
Oh, puh-lease. Apple most certainly did not pay $1,185 per chair if they ordered 12,000 of them. Try half that figure for a ballpark number.
I work for a large outfit that is distinguished by its ownership of thermonuclear devices, among other things. Aeron chairs have never cost us much more than 60% of list. And for what it's worth, Aeron chairs have been my place of calm (and slouching) for the last twenty years. The Pacific may be much better in many ways, but I will never go back to an upholstered chair. The upholstery wears out much faster than the chair (or the Aeron webbing) does, and is far less comfortable on warm days.
I work for the same outfit, and you are correct. I had one that I really liked—don’t remember where it was. I had no idea MSRP was so high on those things until I looked into getting one at home.
I never liked the Aeron, though. After 3 months of back problems, I switched to a crappy chair and was a whole lot better.
If it’s comfy, then it would be worth it, nothing worse than sitting at a desk in an uncomfortable chair all day.
Totally agree. I changed my office chairs 3 times in the first month I joined the company. Bad chairs won't get you thru the day without annoying pains.
Geez, what's next, a big "reveal" to let everyone know that the spaceship campus has 2-ply toilet paper in the restrooms?
Two-ply would be too thick, it's molecular bonded one-ply which is both thin, absorbent, antibacterial and biodegrades before it gets 10 feet down the pipe. I believe that each sheet is invisibly printed with an android logo because it's the only thing in spaceship central which isn't apple-branded.
Comments
For those not in the world of design it may not be obvious how significant this kind of thing is. And lets face it for most people a chair is a horizontal buttock support and not a lot more.
a) If you design for Vitra you are ALREADY in the company of Charles Eames.
b) A big buy like this and the seal of approval from Ive is the next step on the road to design canonisation.
c) For a designer, to have a classic chair in their portfolio is a bit like getting an Oscar. I've worked with a few really good designers in my day who are at this kind of level and one of them, for a hobby collected miniature models of these chairs and paid a significant portion of the price of an actual chair for the models.
Having said all that, my Aeron exec with shiny Chrome beats any other chair I've used and is specced for my just-sub NFL player sized bones, something I can't get with most office chairs.
I never liked the Aeron, though. After 3 months of back problems, I switched to a crappy chair and was a whole lot better.