ARMAS LINDGREN (1874-1929)

The present pair of chairs, executed in the National Romantic style that characterised the Finnish Arts & Crafts movement at the dawn of the twentieth century, were created for use in the Suomi Insurance Building, Helsinki, built 1908-1911. Lindgren was a pivotal figure in the establishment of a new, powerful, Finnish national identity, and together with Herman Gesellius and Eliel Saarinen had designed the Finnish Pavillion at the Exposition Internationale, Paris, 1900. The following year, 1901, the three architects together acquired a site on Lake Vitträsk, where they established Hvittrȁsk, a collective of studios and dwellings for themselves. The site prevailed at the centre of the burgeoning Arts & Crafts movement, and visitors included Gustav Mahler and the author Maxim Gorky. Lindgren’s own dwelling, a wooden tower, was destroyed by fire in 1922, and the following year Saarinen emigrated to the United States where he became artistic director of the celebrated Cranbrook Academy of Arts, thus bringing to a close an important chapter in the development of the Finnish nationalist movement of architecture and design.

A similar pair of throne armchairs are held in the Design Museum, Helsinki.