Jens Risom, the Dane who invented Knoll

Jens Risom (1916-2016) is one of the absolute pioneers of Scandinavian design in America. A Danish designer who emigrated to New York in 1939, he met Hans Knoll and co-founded with him in 1941 the publisher Knoll Furniture, for which he would design the first fifteen pieces of the catalogue, including the famous Risom Lounge Chair in beech and woven webbing (1943). A measured designer and educator, he helped introduce the Scandinavian language into the American home, and his influence can be read in every Knoll designer that followed.

The Risom Lounge Chair, the first chair edited by Knoll, remains Jens Risom's most iconic piece. A Danish-American vintage seat to find for those wanting a founding signature of modern design, at the crossroads of Copenhagen and New York.