Robin Day: Furniture Designer With a Passion for his Art
Sunday, December 2nd, 2007
Knowledge of furniture is good, but sometimes it’s fun to get to know the designers who came up with the pieces we see. While searching for bistro area chairs, I found an outdoor seating unit that I thought was particularly vibrant and attractive, so I dug around until I learned about the man who’d designed the piece: Robin Day. He’s had a life-long love and talent for furniture design.
Day was born in High Wycombe in 1915. At the age of 19, he went to work in a local furniture factory. He spent the next five years attending the Royal College of Art Freelance Practice on a scholarship. He worked and studied to be a graphic exhibition designer.
Ten years after graduation, he entered into a partnership with Clive Latimer, and the two were winners of the New York Museum of Modern Art’s International Competition. Day and Latimer took first prize for their design of low cost furniture.
Two years later, in 1951, Day designed a section of the Home and gardens display at the Festival of Britain. He was then commissioned to design some auditorium seating and other furniture for the Royal Festival Hall. Later that year, Day won a gold medal for his designs at the Triennale Exhibition in Milan.
Day went on to win Design Centre awards in 1957, 1961, 1965, and 1966. In 1959, he was elected the Royal Designer for Industry, and he received an Order of the British Empire in 1983. Since then, he has worked in many fields of design, and was appointed Senior Fellow at the Royal College of Art, as well as Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architecture.
His works can be found online. One example is the GM Sussex Panca (seen above), which would serve well as outdoor bar furniture in the UK – or anywhere!
