Mozart Flexform

Comfort, consistency and high-quality Italian craftsmanship are the values on which furniture manufacturer Flexform has built its global reputation. The third-generation family-run business is based in Brianza, Italy’s premier furniture manufacturing district, and produces sofas, chairs, outdoor seating and other pieces known for their modern aesthetics and functional designs.

The brand dates back to 1959 when the Galimberti brothers — Romeo, Pietro and Agostino — started the Flexform di Galimberti workshop. Flexform prides itself on crafting pieces that are perfectly proportional and versatile enough to adapt to the needs of the user and the space in which they are placed. Always elegant and refined in appearance, Flexform’s furniture is recognizable by its timelessness and use of high-end, sustainably sourced materials like linen, cotton, cashmere and wood including oak, ash, walnut and rosewood. Among the company’s most iconic collections are its take on the sectional sofa, which accounts for how lifestyles have changed: People now read, watch TV, eat and work on sofas. The 2001 Groundpiece collection, designed by Antonio Citterio, is one of its best sellers. The low, deep sofa, with its signature goose-down cushions and padded armrests that provide a flat multipurpose surface, is a casual take on the sectional that focuses on maximum comfort.

The company keeps its designs fresh by collaborating with architects and other designers to bring in new perspectives about people’s wants, needs and interactions with furniture. Designer Citterio, for instance, has been partnering with Flexform for almost 50 years and has been instrumental in creating some of the brand’s most celebrated and successful pieces. Along with the Groundpiece collection, this includes the 1996 metal and leather-upholstered A.B.C. armchair. (Its 2014 update is the award-winning A.B.C.D. chair.) Other partners include some of Italy’s most prominent creative minds: Cini Boeri, Joe Colombo, Paolo Nava, Carlo Colombo and Giulio Manzoni.

With over 20 flagship stores around the world, Flexform’s furniture can be found in spaces as diverse as Middle Eastern hotels, Italian villas and American lofts. By avoiding seasonal trends and focusing on consistent innovations in comfort and style, Flexform has been an exemplary figure of the “Made in Italy” luxury furniture scene.

Find Flexform sofas, lounge chairs and other furniture on 1stDibs.

While this specific seating is known to all for its comfort and familiar form, the history of how your favorite antique or vintage lounge chair came to be is slightly more ambiguous.

Although there are rare armchairs dating back as far as the 17th century, some believe that the origins of the first official “lounge chair” are tied to Hungarian modernist designer-architect Marcel Breuer. Sure, Breuer wasn’t exactly reinventing the wheel when he introduced the Wassily lounge chair in 1925, but his seat was indeed revolutionary for its integration of bent tubular steel.

Officially, a lounge chair is simply defined as a “comfortable armchair,” which allows for the shape and material of the furnishings to be extremely diverse. Whether or not chaise longues make the cut for this category is a matter of frequent debate.

The Eames lounge chair, on the other hand, has come to define somewhat of a universal perception of what a lounge chair can be. Introduced in 1956, the Eames lounger (and its partner in cozy, the ottoman) quickly became staples in television shows, prestigious office buildings and sumptuous living rooms. Venerable American mid-century modern designers Charles and Ray Eames intended for it to be the peak of luxury, which they knew meant taking furniture to the next level of style and comfort. Their chair inspired many modern interpretations of the lounge — as well as numerous copies.

On 1stDibs, find a broad range of unique lounge chairs that includes everything from antique Victorian-era seating to vintage mid-century modern lounge chairs by craftspersons such as Hans Wegner to contemporary choices from today’s innovative designers.