Hundreds of Eames Furniture Pieces Up for Auction

Collectors of midcentury Modern design, get ready. On Sept. 10, a comprehensive archive of nearly 300 pieces of furniture, all designed by Charles and Ray Eames, will go to auction in Chicago. Organized by the Chicago- and New York–based Wright Auctions and curated by Daniel Ostroff, an expert on all things Eames, the JF Chen Collection covers the pair’s work from the 1940s through the ’90s and serves as a compendium of how their famed​​ designs​ have evolved through the decades. The pieces previously belonged to Los Angeles–based collector Joel Chen.

According to Wright Auctions​, the collection is heavy in chairs, storage units, tables, and dining sets. Much of the work was originally commissioned by office-furniture manufacturer Herman Miller, which brought the Eames’​ designs to market in the U.S. and abroad. Items of note include a set of six rosewood DCM chairs (estimated by Wright at $1,500 to $2,000), an ESU storage unit (estimated at $10,000 to $15,000), as well as products designed for the Museum of Modern Art’s 1940 Organic Design competition.

All of the items to be auctioned were previously displayed as part of the Getty Museum’s Pacific Standard Time “Eames Designs: The Guest-Host Relationship“​ exhibition, from 2011 to 2012, and will be digitally archived with photos and documentation in an Eames catalog that will be published on the designers’ website​, run by the Eames Foundation. The collection will be on view at Wright Auctions’ Chicago gallery from Sept. 3 to Sept. 10.

For more information on the auction, visit: www.wright20.com/auctions/2015/09/eames-design-jf-chen-collection/info