Stylish, almost filigree and yet robust: the moser is the epitome of the Swiss chair. Many Swiss consider this simple design classic a “chair of chairs”: the model 1-250, or as it was quickly called by architects and the general public, the “Moser chair”, was in the spotlight from the very beginning and became the best-known piece of furniture from horgenglarus. It is illustrated in all horgenglarus catalogues published since 1932. The architect Werner Max Moser showed his wooden chair for the first time in 1931 in a version with a broad backrest on the occasion of the Neubühl residential exhibition, which he helped to design. The response was also great after the war. It appeared in 1954 on the title of the product catalogue published by the Swiss Werkbund in 1954 and in 1958 it received the “Die gute Form” award as the “183 M” and “183 MA” model. So much honour attracts imitators, but “All other similar and copied chairs are perceived as plagiarism,” it says in the archive records.
The Moser chair is very versatile and can be used for a long time. Werner Max Moser, a student of Frank Lloyd Wright, limited himself to the absolutely necessary in his first furniture design, yet the Moser chair seems familiar with its round, slightly swinging legs. It reminds of the bentwood chairs of the time, as well as the horgenglarus chair classic. There are similarly purist chairs, there are comparably stable and equally comfortable chairs, but in combination the moser is unique thanks to its stable seat frame. The quality of the weave is also superior: The robust Jonc mesh is pulled into the chair frame by hand and knotted there, so it has considerably more hold than a machine mesh that is pressed into a groove. A continuity of the proven, today as modern as ever.