80 Years of Ilmari Tapiovaara’s Classic

Artek is marking eighty years of Ilmari Tapiovaara’s Domus Chair with ten new upholstered editions.

New fabrics, leathers and colours expand the range for 2026, underlining the chair’s long-standing ability to suit interiors from the spare and Nordic to the rich and layered.

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Designed in 1946, the Domus Chair was Tapiovaara’s response to a specific brief: affordable, functional seating for Domus Academica, a student housing complex built to address Helsinki’s post-war accommodation shortage. Working alongside his wife Annikki, Tapiovaara approached the project with the conviction that comfort was a functional requirement, not a luxury. The result was a chair that students would use for studying, eating and conversation alike.

The design quickly outgrew its original setting. Sold in the United Kingdom as the Staxx — a nod to the chair’s stackability — and in North America as the Finn Chair, it found its way into libraries, universities, cafes and private homes. The name Domus, Latin for home, proved apt: this was a chair equally at ease in public and domestic spaces.

Two elements define the Domus Chair’s character. The contoured, form-pressed plywood seat provides natural ergonomic support without imposing bulk. The short, curved armrests — what Tapiovaara described as the handshake of the chair — offer support and freedom of movement in equal measure, and allow the chair to be drawn close to a table and stacked with ease.

The new upholstered editions introduce fabrics and leathers with contrast leather piping. The expanded selection is available alongside the unadorned plywood versions, in natural oak or birch. All Domus Chairs are made in Finland.

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