[4] In 1918, he started his own furniture factory, and changed the chair's colours after becoming influenced by the De Stijl movement, of which he became a member in 1919, the same year in which he became an architect.

From the late 1920s he was concerned with social housing, inexpensive production methods, new materials, prefabrication and standardisation.

In the 1920s and 1930s, however, all his commissions came from private individuals, and it was not until the 1950s that he was able to put his progressive ideas about social housing into practice, in projects in Utrecht and Reeuwijk.

In 1951 Rietveld designed a retrospective exhibition about De Stijl which was held in Amsterdam, Venice and New York.

In subsequent years he was given many commissions, including the Dutch pavilion for the Venice Biennale (1953), the art academies in Amsterdam and Arnhem, and the press room for the UNESCO building in Paris.

[9] "Gerrit Rietveld: A Centenary Exhibition" at the Barry Friedman Gallery, New York, in 1988 was the first comprehensive presentation of the Dutch architect's original works ever held in the U.S.