Well that was disappointing mass produced ! Templates , Robotics I thought they would be handmade one by one All production line furniture, it killed the mystic and I am a mid century fanatic :(
The Diamond Collection has been mass produced since the chair came to fruition in 1952. Post WWII, the design champions of organic modernism (Harry Bertoia and Eero Saarinen, etc) harnessed wartime advances in defense technology to develop new furniture and products for the fast-expanding post-war population. "After two years of experimentation and prototyping, Harry Bertoia finishes his collection of wire seating. Knoll releases the Bertoia Collection in small batches while the development group finalizes techniques for mass producing the chair. Bertoia’s assistant, Richard Schultz, later recalled, “We just knew from the very beginning that these chairs were going to be extraordinary.” www.knoll.com/discover-knoll/timeline#y_1952
The key word "Mass Produced" just like a GMH or FORD I have restored many icon pieces from all over the world and when I examine every piece I admired the craftmenship of the design but when I see a production line of chairs put on templates and stud welded together, well the Bertoia craft has disappeared
If you'll notice, each chair is manually welded and later hand cleaned. There has to be some robotics or they'd have to charge a lot more. I think these retained the designers original intent more than most!
I think if you have any experience actually fabricating something of this nature, you'd be much more impressed how much IS still done by hand. It would cost 2x-3x as much, if not more, if it were completely "handmade". I, as a fabricator, am seriously impressed at the level of manual skilled labor used.
