What Does Affordable Design Look Like?
It looks beautiful when it’s from the hands of designer Yves Béhar. Who, with Herman Miller, set out to dispel the misconception that affordable meant offhand design and questionable quality.
Looking for affordability in innovation, Béhar and Herman Miller engineers spent months developing a unique suspension material for the backrest of SAYL. The resulting breakthrough molded ergonomic support directly into the back of the chair, which was then stretched into place. It also replaced foam and fabric, typical to other low-cost task chairs, with a single recyclable material. Less material and fewer manufacturing steps, all saved money. A point not lost on Spencer Bailey of Bloomberg Businessweek, who recently described SAYL as “An executive-quality perch that doesn’t require an executive’s bonus to buy.”