Verner Panton - The Panton Chair

Verner Panton

Verner Panton is well known for his fluid and colorful design and as a pioneer of modern plastic use in products. He is an iconic designer who still inspire designers and architects with his work. One of his most successful piece of work was the Panton chair which was the first one piece molded chair every produced from plastic.

Panton described himself in his own words as "The main purpose of my work is to provoke people into using their imagination. Most people spend their lives living in dreary, grey-beige conformity, mortally afraid of using colors. By experimenting with lighting, colors, textiles and furniture and utilizing the latest technologies, I try to show new ways, to encourage people to use their phantasy imagination and make their surroundings more exciting".

Modular furniture by Verner Panton

Verner Pnaton started his studies at the Royal Art Academy in Copenhagen where he studied architecture among several successful designer in the world. In his early career he traveled around Europe in his highly noticeable Volkswagen van with hope to sell his design to manufacturers. He set off from Copenhagen, Denmark, which "was then the center of the contemporary design scene".

The Panton chair is one of his iconic design produced and one of the most successful. It had taken several years of development for the final design that we know today. It was the first product wich was molded in a single piece in plastic. At the time the plastic was made with the introduction of reinforcement, which was fiber glass. But before the final product Panton had to go trough a process such as a model to show the product to the manufacturers. After his first sketches which illustrated clearly the final aesthetics of the products, Panton build a model made from polystyrene which was not suitable for sitting but clearly showed the manufacturers the final product. Today the majority of the designers use Polystyrene to build their first prototypes of their products to visualize more how the product is going to look and by making models it enables the designers to spot several flows that during sketching are almost impossible to notice.

Development of the Panton chair

The Panton chair was finally presented in public in August of 1967 after Pantom and his family moved to Basle to further develop his relastions with the manufacturing company Vitra. Since the first presentation of the products, the Panton chair was produced in four different types of plastic and manufactures by different improved technology.

"The production history of the Panton Chair is as follows:

1967/68
initial series production from cold-moulded, fibre-glass reinforced polyester resin, painted in various colours. Manufacturer: Herman Miller/Vitra

1968-1971
the second series model made of polyurethane rigid foam, painted in various colours.
Manufacturer: Herman Miller/Vitra

1971-1979 
the third series model made of coloured thermoplastic polystyrene (Luran S). The chairs made of this material can be identified by the ridges below the bend between the seating area and the base. 
Manufacturer: Vitra; in the USA until 1975 Herman Miller

The Panton Chair was not in production from 1979 to 1983.

1983 to present day
second version of the chair made of painted polyurethane rigid foam. This series can be identified by Panton's signature on the base. 
Manufacturer: 1983-1990 Horn on behalf of the WK Group; since 1990 Vitra; since 1999 this model has been marketed under the name Panton Chair Classic. 

1999 to present day
fourth series model made of coloured polypropylene.
Manufacturer: Vitra 

2005 to present day
Panton Junior made of coloured polypropylene (a smaller version of the Panton Chair made to scale for children from the age of three). 
Manufacturer: Vitra".

Panton chair for children

Reference : 

Vitra | Verner Panton. 2014. Vitra | Verner Panton. [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.vitra.com/en-us/corporation/designer/details/97695. [Accessed 04 January 2014].

Panton-Chair - Vitra-245-2 - Verner Panton. 2014. Panton-Chair - Vitra-245-2 - Verner Panton. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.verner-panton.com/furniture/archive/phase/1705/. [Accessed 04 January 2014].

Verner Panton | Nest.co.uk. 2014. Verner Panton | Nest.co.uk. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.nest.co.uk/browse/designer/verner-panton?pg=2. [Accessed 04 January 2014].

VERNER PANTON - Verpan. 2014. VERNER PANTON - Verpan. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.verpan.com/verner+panton/verner+panton. [Accessed 04 January 2014].

Verner Panton / Design Museum Collection : - Design/Designer Information. 2014. Verner Panton / Design Museum Collection : - Design/Designer Information. [ONLINE] Available at: http://designmuseum.org/design/verner-panton. [Accessed 04 January 2014].