Vitra: The Anatomy of a Design Company traces three generations of the Fehlbaum family and the company they built—from a Swiss shopfitting manufacturer into the most consequential patron of furniture design of the past 70 years.
About This Book
Written by Deyan Sudjic in close collaboration with Rolf Fehlbaum, who led Vitra for more than 30 years, this is a company history that doubles as an argument about what a design company can be for. Vitra's influence was never confined to what it manufactured. It runs through the campus at Weil am Rhein, with buildings by Tadao Ando, Herzog & de Meuron, Frank Gehry and Álvaro Siza; through the Vitra Design Museum and the archives of Jean Prouvé, Alexander Girard and Luis Barragán that the company safeguards; and through the careers of designers it backed early, among them Jasper Morrison and Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec. Sudjic is unusually well placed to read that record, and he does so without flattering it. Karen Stein contributes inserts on individual episodes, and Iwan Baan a photographic essay on the campus as it stands now.
Key Features
- Written by Deyan Sudjic in close collaboration with Rolf Fehlbaum
- More than 400 illustrations across a substantial large-format volume
- Inserts written by Karen Stein and a photographic essay by Iwan Baan
- Collaborations from Charles and Ray Eames to Zaha Hadid, Ron Arad and Virgil Abloh
- Documents the architecture of the Vitra Campus at Weil am Rhein
What You'll Discover
- How a family manufacturing business built a design programme with the reach of a cultural institution
- The working method behind Vitra's long collaborations—what the company asks of designers, and what it offers them in return
- Why Vitra invested in architecture, a museum and an archive at all, and what those investments returned
- How the reputations of Prouvé, Panton and Girard were shaped by the company that reissued their work
- The role of design in a business, told from inside the decisions rather than after the fact
About the Author
Deyan Sudjic is Director Emeritus of the Design Museum in London and Distinguished Professor of Design and Architectural Studies at Lancaster University. He edited Domus in Milan, directed the Venice Architecture Biennale, and writes for the Financial Times. Karen Stein is an architectural adviser and critic, and a former editorial director of Phaidon Press. Iwan Baan is an architectural photographer and the inaugural recipient of the Julius Shulman award for photography.
Specifications
- Format: Hardcover
- Dimensions: 28 x 23 cm
- Pages: 410
- Language: English
- ISBN: 9781837290000
- Publisher: Phaidon
- Publication Date: 17 December 2025
Perfect For: Designers, architects and collectors interested in furniture design, design history, and the relationship between manufacturing, patronage and culture.