Born in Finland, Eero Saarinen (1910-1961) emigrated at the age of thirteen to the United States of America in 1923. He grew up in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where he took courses in sculpture and furniture design, established a close relationship with fellow students Charles and Ray Eames, and also became good friends with Florence Knoll (then Schust).

Neglected for most of her career, Eileen Gray (1878-1976) is now regarded as one of the most important furniture designers and architects of the early twentieth century and the most influential woman in those fields. Her work inspired both modernism and Art Deco.

German architect Ludwig Mies van der Roheis,without doubt,one of the pioneering masters of modern architecture.

Arne Jacobsen is one of the few architects really wellknown for both his radical furniture designs and architecture career; SAS Royal Hotel and the National Bank are two of his most important buildings as an architect, while such items of furniture as The Egg chair, Series 7 chair,The Ant and The Swan chair have long since become icons of Danish furniture design. One of the new features of Arne Jacobsen’s furniture design were his organic lines and sculptural elements, all of which are abundantly visible in such pieces of furniture as The Swan chair and The Egg chair.

Best know for their contributions to architecture, furniture design, industrial design, film and photography. Charles and Ray Eames remain among the most renowned American designers of the twentieth century. In 1946, Evans Products began producing the Eames molded plywood furniture. Their iconic molded plywood chair was called the chair of the century by the influential architectural critic Esther McCoy.

Jean Prouvé opened his own smithy in Nancy 1923, and shortly thereafter produced his first furniture made from thin sheet steel. Right away, Prouve s sparse, geometric aesthetic appealed to avant garde architects such Robert Mallet-Stevens and Le Corbusier, who commissioned ironwork from him, and in 1929, invited Prouvé to jin the new Union des Artistes Modernes, a group of artists and designers championing the Modern Movement. Besides creating furniture, he also explored designs for pre-fabricated housing, constructing dwellings for the homeless.

Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) is the most prestigious Finnish architect of the last century, and the father of Nordic Modernism. He once said: God created paper for the purpose of drawing architecture on it. Everything else is at least for me an abuse of paper. Aalto s Modernism entailed the use of natural materials, warm colors, and undulating lines, and he is considered an important early exponent of Organic Design as a result.