Design is fine. History is mine.

It is hard to believe that this chair was designed almost a century ago. With its flowing cantilever silhouette and sculptural simplicity, the “Sitzgeist” looks remarkably contemporary. Yet Heinz and Bodo Rasch introduced it in 1927, the very year the Weißenhof Estate in Stuttgart became an international showcase for a new vision of modern living.

Apart from few examples, the ‘Sitzgeistuhl’ never went into production. The original chair from 1927 can be seen at the Tecta Kragstuhlmuseumin Lauenförde, Germany, where it is exhibited alongside other milestones in the history of the cantilever chair.

As part of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s contribution to the Werkbund exhibition, the Rasch brothers designed the interior of the “Bachelor’s Room” (Zimmer für einen Junggesellen) in Mies’ apartment block. The Sitzgeist Chair was one of the key pieces in this visionary interior – a setting that perfectly reflected the architects’ ideas about modern living.

The model apartment of a bachelor in the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Building, including the prominent Sitzgeist Chair, Weissenhof Estate, 1927. Photo Otto Lossen. Archiv Marzona.

The Rasch brothers’ design for their show flat envisaged a flexible floor plan with transformable walls and matching furnishings. This is the isometric drawing of the Rasch Brothers:

Their collaboration with Mies extended beyond the exhibition itself. During the planning of the Weißenhof Estate, Mies occasionally used the brothers’ modest Stuttgart studio as a workplace. Heinz Rasch described the experience with characteristic humour in a letter to his fiancée dated 15 February 1927.

“He’s taken over two large drawing boards with all their equipment. He’s a big man, broad enough for two, with heels twelve centimetres wide – I’m beginning to feel rather cramped. But things are going very well and, above all, working together is tremendously stimulating.”

Heinz Rasch about Mies van der Rohe

Building of the Weißenhofsiedlung (housing development) in Stuttgart. 1927. Vintage ferrotyped gelatin silver print. Photographer’s stamp Dr. Lossen & Co. Stuttgart; via Wiki

While Marcel Breuer’s tubular steel B3 (later Wassily Chair) embodied the Bauhaus fascination with industrial materials, the Rasch brothers pursued a different path. They explored the structural possibilities of laminated wood, creating a remarkably light cantilever chair whose elegant construction remains as compelling today as it was in 1927.

An issue of the German magazine Uhu from 1928 captured this moment of transition, placing Breuer’s steel chair and the Raschs’ Sitzgeist Chair side by side beneath the headline “May I Offer You a Chair?” – a visual dialogue between two different visions of modern seating. SLUB Archive

Unlike many experimental chairs of the period, the Sitzgeist Chair was conceived around the moving human body rather than geometry alone. In their influential 1928 publication Der Stuhl, the Rasch brothers argued that chairs should not force the body into rigid positions but should support changing postures naturally.

To achieve this, they employed laminated wood-thin layers of veneer glued under tension into a strong yet slightly flexible structure. The material allowed the chair to absorb movement while remaining exceptionally lightweight.

Sitzgeist Chair, photo: Tecta Kragstuhlmuseum in Lauenförde, Germany

Just over a decade later, Charles Eames began experimenting with moulded plywood, presenting an early bent-plywood chair prototype, developed with Eero Saarinen, in the Museum of Modern Art’s Organic Design in Home Furnishings competition (1940). After the Second World War, Charles and Ray Eames refined these techniques further, making moulded plywood one of the defining materials of post-war furniture design. The Sitzgeist Chair demonstrates that the structural and ergonomic potential of laminated wood had already been explored in Germany during the late 1920s.

The unusual name Sitz-Geist (“seat-spirit”) comes from a satirical poem by Christian Morgenstern, Der Ästhet. In it, the poet humorously declares that a real aesthete does not sit according to the needs of his body but according to the demands of his “seat-spirit,” valuing style above comfort. The Rasch brothers adopted the title with a wink, yet their chair ultimately disproves the poem’s irony: despite its sculptural appearance, the design pursued genuine ergonomic thinking.

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Although this chair never entered serial production, it anticipated many of the ideas that would shape modern furniture in the decades to come. Its flexible cantilever construction, economical use of laminated wood and concern for human ergonomy positioned it well ahead of its time.

The sitzgeist chair presented at the exhibition The Unfetterd Gaze – The Rasch Brothers and their influences on Modern Architecture – at Marta Museum, Herford, 2014. Photo Hans Schröder.

Exibition Catalogue The Unfetterd Gaze, Marta Museum, Herford, 2014. Photo Pentagram Berlin

Heinz (left) and Bodo Rasch (right), photo postcard, unknown date.

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Sources
Der Stuhl (1928)
Uhu (1928) via Arthistoricum
Heinz & Bodo Rasch / SL Rasch – History of the Rasch Brothers
Tecta Kragstuhlmuseum
Katharina Stolz, Der Architekt Bodo Rasch – Sein Leben und Werk (University of Stuttgart )