Bruno Rey

For four years Rey worked for an architectural office that furnished the Intercontinental Hotel in Geneva.

In the late 1960s, he started collaborating with the Swiss furniture company Dietiker & Co. in Stein am Rhein,[1] and developed several chair series for them between 1970 and 1984.

Rey developed models and prototypes at his own expense but their production never happened, "which was a failure and at that time hard to digest," he admitted.

[5] He also experimented with wood, searching for the design of a contemporary wooden chair as a symbol of the present.

In 1989 the invention of aluminium pressure die casting then allowed for the industrial production of the chair in large series.

Except for the final finishing, the entire production process could then be done by machine, including the gluing of the wood and metal at a bonding carousel.

[6] In 1977 Rey started collaborating with designer Charles Polin (born 1951), who specialized in seating for public and private spaces.

The frames of both the seat and the back consist of flat solid beech wood profiles and are connected with chrome plated, flexible steel springs.

[citation needed] In 1987 Rey moved his studio from the old town of Baden to the former farming village of Gebenstorf.

Rey and Polin worked as official partners together in a converted farmhouse which had a drawing room and an extensive workshop, which was also fully equipped for model making.

They developed numerous award-winning furniture pieces for companies such as Hiller Objektmöbel, Kusch+Co and Plank GmbH.

[5] –– Bruno Rey I want to make complex relationships visible and manageable, instead of contributing even more to the superfluous and superficial.