Niels Diffrient

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Niels Diffrient

Niels Diffrient (born 1928) is an American industrial designer. Diffrient focuses mainly on ergonomic seating, and his most recent and well known designs are the Freedom and Liberty chairs, manufactured by Humanscale.

1 Biography
2 Awards
3 Products designed by Niels Diffrient
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Biography

Humanscale's Freedom Chair

Diffrient was born in 1928 in a farmhouse in Star, Mississippi.^[1]

During the Great Depression his family relocated to Detroit, where Diffrient attended Cass Technical High School. He then attended Wayne State University, and finally Cranbrook Academy of Art, where he received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in design and architecture and excelled as an outstanding student, winning the First Medal in Design three of his four years there.

While in Italy on a Fulbright Scholarship in 1954, Diffrient went to work in the studio of Marco Zanuso, where he assisted with the design of an award-winning Borletti sewing machine.

Upon arriving back in the United States, Diffrient worked in the office of Henry Dreyfuss. In 1980 after 25 years with Henry Dreyfuss Associates[1], Diffrient left to start his own independent practice.

In his career, which has now lasted over a half century, Diffrient has designed every type of equipment, as well as computers, exhibits, trucks, airplane interiors and corporate identity programs. He has also been broadly published in the field of design and human factors, most notably as co-author of the three-volume publication, Humanscale, in 1974 and 1981.

Additionally, Niels spent time as adjunct Professor of Design at UCLA for eight years and was a visiting critic at the Yale University School of Architecture for two years.

[edit] Awards

In the field of furniture design, most notably ergonomic seating, Niels has won a total of 24 awards, including two Best of Show and 10 Gold and Top awards. Diffrient holds more than 46 design and utility patents on furniture designs in America and abroad, and his many honors include the I.D. (magazine) Top 40 Design Innovators of 1996, the 1999 Chrysler Award for Innovation, the Smithsonian’s 2002 Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award for Product Design, and the 2005 Legend Award from Contract magazine[2]. In 2007, Forbes.com[3] named Diffrient the "granddaddy of the ergonomic revolution" and one of ten "Tastemakers" in the field of industrial design[4]. Diffrient is also an Honorary Royal Designer for Industry, awarded by the Royal Society of Arts and Industry[5], London.