Important Information: This unit type is particularly bulky/heavy. Only in exceptional cases, where the local conditions on site allow it, it can be delivered fully assembled. If this is not possible, it will be delivered partially assembled and the final assembly undertaken on site. This service is only bookable in Germany for an additional charge (149, - EUR basic price + 2% of the value of goods). If you decide to have the object delivered completely assembled by standard delivery service, please pay close attention to the weight of the object!
| Product type | Clothes rack |
| Dimensions | Overall: H 179 x L 153 x D 53 cm Ball centre to ball centre: H 175 + 4 x L 150 x D 50 cm |
| Weight | 105 kg |
| Colours |                |
| Colour chart | Request a USM Haller Colour Fan |
| Material | Panels: Metal, powder coated Structure: Steel, chrome plated Ball: Brass, chrome plated |
| Function & properties | 2 rails for hangers 2 drop-down doors, lower left 1 extension door, top right |
| Care | Chrome plated, powder coated and glass elements should be cleaned with a damp, light cloth and subsequently dried. Stubborn stains can be cleaned with glass cleaner or water mixed with ethanol in a ratio of 10:1 Please click on picture for detailed information (ca. 1,6 MB). 
|
| Awards & museum | Permanent collection MoMA, New York |
| Certificates | Inflammable class 1 (DIN 4102) GREENGUARD - Indoor Air Quality LEED "Green Directive"" |
| Warranty | 24 months |
| Product family | USM Haller Clothes Racks |
| Product brochure | Please click on the picture for detailed information (ca. 8,7 MB). |
With the USM modular furniture system a wide range of furniture objects can be constructed from three basic elements: metal tubes form the framework, chrome plated brass balls act as the connection points and metal or glass panels used provide decoration and cladding. The spectrum of possible configurations ranges from simple shelving constructions such as the popular USM Haller Sideboards, over tables and roll containers all the way up to to modern wardrobes. Originally, the architect Fritz Haller developed the USM furniture in the 1960s as office furniture for the new USM administrative building; however with the first large order, in 1969 for the Rothschild Bank in Paris, series production began. And thus the USM Haller success story that continues to this day. Characteristic of USM Haller shelving is its modular character and minimalist design. And the classically elegant effect created by the different surfaces and the clearly defined structure.
The architect Fritz Haller was born in Solothurn, Switzerland, in 1924 and designed a wide range functionalist buildings, such as schools, workshops and office buildings. In 1961, then USM CEO Paul Schärer commissioned Fritz Haller with the construction of new manufacturing and administration buildings, a commission for which the architect subsequently designed the USM office furniture as a complementary interior design. This is Haller's only furniture design and has become his most famous work and his modular shelving system has not only received numerous prizes but in 2001 was added to the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Fritz Haller died in 2012 in his native Switzerland.
Assembly of the USM Haller skeleton
The USM Haller wardrobe is the result of a long history: In 1885, Paul Schärer's ancestor Ulrich Schärer founded USM as a metalworking shop and hardware store in the Swiss town of Münsingen near Bern. With the production of window closures and the introduction of general metal and sheet metal processing in the first half of the twentieth century, the business not only expanded but the conditions for the production of the shelving system by Fritz Haller were laid. Since 1969, the furniture produced in series in Münsingen; since 1988, the furniture has been protected by copyright and was classified as a work of applied art in a judicial procedure. With showrooms from Tokyo to New York, USM has made a name for itself worldwide and now focuses exclusively on the manufacture and development of USM Haller furniture: for example, in 2017 USM launched the integration of light and power supply elements into USM Haller units.
Colourful ensemble: USM Haller and Vitra in the entrance area
The USM Haller shelves, which were developed in the 1960s in Münsingen, Switzerland, and all the basic USM building blocks are still produced there, and the metal trays are powder coated in the 15 USM colors USM. The final assebly for the German market takes place in Leipzig: the transport of individual parts is space-saving and thus ecologically more meaningful, however, the company also fulfills its ecological responsibility in other ways. All production processes are justifiable from the point of view of environmental protection, the concentration on a singl production site reduces the CO2 emissions through transport routes and last but not least the high quality and flexibility of the USM furniture system bequeath the objects a very long life. In addition, the USM furniture has been awarded the Greenguard Indoor Quality Certificate, which guarantees low-emission products and thus a healthier indoor climate.
Fritz Haller developed his modular furniture system, as well as his buildings, true to the famous saying "form follows function" and thus in the sense of functionalism. With the Dessau Bauhaus, the term "functionalism" gained relevance: at that time, the focus shifted from the craftsmans, expressionist design approach from the Weimar period to a factual form, which should preferably be implemented by industrial manufacturing processes. The beauty in architecture and design should then arise from the functionality of an object. Forty years later Haller's USM shelving employs this understanding of design. Focussing on the function results in the strict and minimalist design of USM Haller furniture, a design which has been combining style and function for decades. This combination has made it the perfect storage solution for offices and homes alike.
Timeless design for living room and bedroom: USM Haller chest of drawers
...USM Haller A Fritz; A Ball; A System Within the diaries of Heidi, those central documents in the re-telling of the earliest (hi)story of the contemporary Switzerland, it is recorded that one of the oldest examples of vernacular Swiss furniture is the modular metal storage system of the Usm...
...Developed in the mid-1960s as an office furniture system, the inherent flexibility and variability of USM Haller's modular system has allowed it to naturally evolve alongside office practices and realities; for example, alongside the shift in recent decades from rigid to more flexible office scenographies, alongside the rise in recent decades of home working, or, most recently, with the USM Security Screen which naturally, and quickly, allows any existing USM reception desk to be effortlessly updated and reinvented for our Corona age... A landscape USM Haller quickly inhabited and where over the decades the inherent flexibility and variability of its modular system has seen it naturally adapt to the ever evolving realities of domestic life: the domestic life of both the private individual with all its personal fluctuations, high, lows and unpredictability, but also of communal society and, for example, its ever increasing collective networked, digital structure...
...With the showcase USM Haller HomeWork smow Cologne consider responses to such evolutions with the assistance of the USM Haller modular furniture system... For all that USM Haller is a modular furniture system it is fundamentally a modular architecture system...
...Staged under the title "Ambassadors of Creative Innovation" the Swiss Embassy 3daysofdesign 2019 showcase presented works from established Swiss brands such as Vitra, USM Haller, Création Baumann, Caran d'Ache or Laufen, who presented their new SAVE urine directing toilet concept realised in conjunction with Vienna based studio EOOS and Eawag, the aquatic research institute at the ETH Zürich; younger brands such as Viu eyewear or Zürich based Qwstion with their bags crafted from Bananatex, a textile made from, well, banana plants, not yet Zürcher Bananas, but if we're not all careful it may only be a matter of time, and no-one wants that; and students from the Architecture and Wood & Civil Engineering departments at the Berner Fachhochschule, who, in inter-disciplinary teams of two, considered under the title "Furniture for a Pop-up Embassy", representative, temporary, variable, momentary furniture...
...To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Fritz Haller and Paul Schärer's USM Haller modular furniture system USM instigated a series of masterclasses in which students at seven international design schools were paired with a mentor and asked to "Rethink the Modular" and for all to "consider the significance of modularity in architecture and design" and so "exploit the idea of modularity for contemporary design"... In addition to presenting some truly magnificent works from the likes of Volker Albus, Ettore Sottsass or Hans Hollein Relation also featured a more detailed exploration of Fritz Haller's oeuvre than you are likely to find outwith a dedicated Haller exhibition: and a showcase which delightfully elucidated how much more Fritz Haller is and was than his modular furniture system, makes as such perfectly clear what a travesty it is that he is largely only known for his modular furniture system and so by extrapolation underscores why Rethink the Modular is as much a tribute to Fritz Haller as a celebration of system USM Haller: modular is a way of thinking...
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