Bauhaus MR10 Cantilever Chair attributed to Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe, 1930s

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This is a rare, very early example of Mies van Der Rohe’s MR10 cantilevered side chair or Freischwinger. The chair has significant distinguishing features that can be seen in the photographs as follows.
. A fully welded structure, the curved cross member under the seat being welded in place and not screwed in.
. A completely seamless, continuous, tubular frame with no visible joins to the tubular steel at all.
. Backing strips of chromed steel which hold the leather to the rear of the frame by screwing into to steel strips welded to the frame itself, rather than into the tubular uprights, or with later models, the leather wrapped around and laced or stitched.
. Small hooks welded to the underside of the seat rails at the front , designed to prevent the leather seat sliding forwards and downwards over the curved leg fronts.
. The frame tapering slightly towards the rear, being widest (49cm) at the mid point of the front curved legs tapering to 47.5 at the rear of the seat, to a minimum width of 45 at the top of the chair.

These features are, each on their own, unusual and rare if not unique, and when combined in the single chair, lead us to believe that this is a very early example, perhaps some form of prototype and certainly of careful, costly manufacture by hand. The frame is however chrome plated rather than nickel plated, suggesting to us a time of manufacture two or three years after the very first chairs produced by Metallgewerbe Joseph Müller.
Bamberg Metallwerkstätten, we believe, did produce chairs with chrome plating around this time. We are also aware that Bigler, Spichiger und Cie. AG (Bigla) produced Mies chairs at this time. We would date this chair to Ca. 1930. We cannot make a firm attribution to the manufacturer as we have not seen another example with the features present here other than an identical chair with the original leather still intact that we have already sold. We have not been able to access original design records. There is no makers label present as is to be expected with such an early production.

This is a completely original, early chair frame in good used condition with wear to the chrome in the form of numerous surface scratches, most noticeable at the base of the chair.
The leather has been replaced with an aged finish thick new leather as can be seen, as the original leather had completely disintegrated and no longer functioned. The replacement leather, is, we believe, visually in keeping with the age of this chair.

The seat height to the tubular frame at the front of the seat is 48.5cm, to the rear of the seat 46cm. The tubing is 25mm in diameter.

The seat height is 40cm at the front and 45cm at the rear of the seat