Ray Eames was a painter, sculptor, and pioneer of modern design. She brought her lifelong interest in structure and formal training in the principals of abstraction to the innovative design partnership she formed with her husband, Charles, in 1941. Together the pair redefined American interiors through their attention to functional, attractive, comfortable, and affordable furnishings for the home.

As with many husband-wife artistic partnerships of this era, Charles received most of the public recognition for their joint work. But without Ray’s keen sense color (often inspired by the primary colors of modernist painter Mondrian) and adroit ability to compose abstract forms in lyrical three dimensional compositions, the Eames brand would never have achieved so much.

In the early 1940s, Ray and Charles Eames pioneered a production method to bend plywood in more than one direction, using their homemade Kazam machine. (One of them put a piece of wood into the machine and—Kazam!—it was bent…) The United States Navy commissioned the Eameses to design plywood leg splints and stretchers for wounded sailors, featuring compound curves to support the body (examples of these splints are on the wall). The couple applied the same technology to the body-conforming design of their mass-produced chairs, including this child's chair that was only produced for one year.

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