Thonet

Heritage

The history of Thonet began with the cabinetmaker and joiner Michael Thonet, who opened his first workshop in 1819 in Boppard on the Rhine. Encouraged by the Austrian State Chancellor Prince Metternich, he moved to Vienna, worked on the interiors of Palais Liechtenstein, and in 1849 founded a company there, renamed Gebrüder Thonet in 1853. Furnishing Café Daum with chair No. 4 made the firm famous across Vienna from 1850; the international breakthrough came in 1859 with chair No. 14 (today the 214), the Vienna coffee house chair whose bent solid beech made near-industrial production possible.

Philosophy

Thonet describes its principle as rational construction and exceptional material efficiency: modular parts produced by division of labour and shipped flat, 36 chairs to a cubic metre. Its furniture is made to last for generations and can be repaired in Frankenberg. The company states that its bentwood and tubular steel originals remain living collections rather than museum pieces.

Iconic Works

• 214 coffee house chair (1859) and the 209 armchair
• B 9, which Thonet names its first tubular steel furniture
• S 32 / S 64 cantilever chairs and S 35 chair by Marcel Breuer
• 118 by Sebastian Herkner, a contemporary reference to the 214

Today

Thonet GmbH is headquartered in Frankenberg (Eder), Germany, where the factory has produced furniture since 1889 and the Museum Thonet opened in 1989. It remains a family business, partly owned by the fifth and sixth generations of the Thonet family and partly by the Benner family office. Recent designers include Stefan Diez, Norman Foster, Naoto Fukasawa, Piero Lissoni and Sebastian Herkner. The 214 received the German Sustainability Award Design 2021 and the German Ecodesign Award 2024.