Walter Knoll Team

Walter Knoll

Walter Knoll was born in Stuttgart in 1878 as the son of a upholstered furniture manufacturer. After his military service, and serving in the family business, he tried to become a self-employed merchant, but failed and fled to the US to escape creditors. In 1907, he returned to his homeland and, together with his brother Wilhelm, took over the paternal leather business. His first-born son Robert later took over his father's business, and his second son, Hans Knoll, founded the US furniture company Knoll International Inc. in 1938. After years in Vienna and New York, Walter Knoll returned to Stuttgart and founded - together with Paul Hahn - Walter Knoll & Co. He had contact with important Bauhaus protagonists such as Walter Gropius and was thereby the first manufacturer to specialize in the serial production of Bauhaus furniture. In addition, Walter Knoll furnished several apartments of Mies van der Rohe at the Weißenhofsiedlung. Until 1964, Walter Knoll remained the managing director of his company and died in 1971 - meaning he no longer experienced the furnishing of the airport Tegel by the company 1975. In 1993, Rolf Benz took over the internationally renowned company.