Pastilli Rocking Chair

The Pastil chair (also known as the Gyro or Rock ‘n’ Roll chair) is one of the great innovative designs in plastic furniture from the late 1960s. Designed by Eero Aarnio, the chair won an American Society of Interior Design award when it was introduced in 1968. It is made of molded plastic with a single seam running around its equator. Its rounded shape allows it to function as a rocking chair, and the plastic makes it suitable for both indoor and outdoor use. The Pastil was produced in a number of bright colors including red and deep yellow. Aarnio, who had a design studio near Helsinki in 1963, experimented with rounded furniture forms made of rattan in the mid-1960s before moving into plastics. One of his other designs in plastic, the Globe chair (also known as the Ball or Sphere) is an icon of 1960s pop furniture. The Pastil was manufactured by the Finnish firm Asko from 1968 to 1980, and was reissued again in 1991. The chair proposed for acquisition would complement other seminal plastic furniture designs from the 1960s in the museum’s collection, including pieces by Joe Columbo and Verner Panton.