Charles Pollock Receives 2013 Rowena Reed Kostellow Award

Prolific chair designer Charles Pollock will be honored with the Rowena Reed Kostellow Award for his dedication to three-dimensional design. The ceremony will be on Thursday, April 4, 2013, at the Bernhardt Design showroom, 58 West 40th Street, 3rd Floor, NYC, 6:00 – 8:00 pm.

The Award recognizes individuals who advance the principles of design developed by Rowena Reed Kostellow and rewards those who have excelled in their application.

“We were in the same Rowena 3D class,” says Lucia DeRespinis. “It was evident he possessed an unusual natural ability. Chuck is being celebrated for his great talent.”

“When I was helping him make a prototype of one of his chairs, he would yell at me to move the curve ’a millionth of an inch’! That’s the kind of perfection I heard from Miss Reed, too,” says Tucker Viemeister, Rowena Fund Chair.

Pollock arrived at Pratt from Michigan with a full scholarship, where he bent wire models that he altered numerous times until he was satisfied with the design. He graduated in 1952 and took that process to George Nelson, where they designed the Swag Leg chair for Herman Miller in 1958. It is in museum collections, including the Met. Florence Knoll’s recognition of his talent helped secure his reputation as one of the world’s preeminent furniture designers. The Pollock Executive Chair they developed is the best-selling executive chair in the history of office furniture design. An instant success when it was released in 1963, with its distinctive and patented aluminum rim technology holding it together both structurally and visually, it became a visual symbol of the modern workplace. It was exhibited in the Louvre in Paris and is still in production by Knoll. He designed Penelope Chair for Castelli (now part of Haworth). His new CP Lounge Chair for Bernhardt Design was the hit of last year’s ICFF furniture fair, where he was awarded for his body of work. He told the New York Times, “A chair, it’s like a sculpture.”

Charles Pollock joins other champions of the abstract principles of visual relationships who have received the Award. These teachers, entrepreneurs, and designers embody the mission of the fund: to encourage and guide a systematic educational approach to all forms of visual expression, which is inspired by Rowena’s teaching.