Dieter Rams, Charles and Ray Eames, and Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel became influential by making design answer everyday needs. Rams pursued useful, durable clarity; the Eameses treated design as a collaborative response to social and client needs; Chanel used comfort and practical clothes to expand freedom of movement. They are three examples of different paths to influence, not a definitive roster of iconic designers.
What made these designers influential?
Their shared achievement was not a single look. Each connected a design idea to how people live: how an object works and lasts, how a project serves overlapping needs, or how clothing lets its wearer move. The visible results differ, but all three made practical concerns part of a recognizable design language.
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| Designer | Problem addressed | Approach | Visible work |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dieter Rams | Making products clear, useful, and durable | Craft, restraint, and attention to how an object works | Braun products and furniture including Vitsœ’s 620 chair |
| Charles and Ray Eames | Serving the needs of clients, society, and designers | Collaborative problem-solving and experimentation across materials and media | Furniture, housing designs, exhibitions, and multimedia presentations |
| Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel | Making women’s clothing more comfortable and practical | Jersey and less restrictive silhouettes | Jersey garments, the little black dress, and the Chanel suit |
Dieter Rams: restraint in service of usefulness
Rams is associated with Braun and is known for a set of ten principles of good design. They include innovation, usefulness, aesthetic quality, making a product understandable, unobtrusiveness, honesty, durability, attention to detail, environmental concern, and designing with as little as possible. The principles are broader than minimal appearance: restraint matters because it can make a product work, communicate, and last. The Design Museum summarizes the principles in its Dieter Rams profile.
In an interview with Vitra Design Museum Director Mateo Kries, Rams rejected the idea that his principles were an expression of a national style, connecting them instead to craft traditions and tools that work well. He also spoke about design’s environmental consequences and the problem of creating more disposable-seeming objects. His concise formulation was: “Good design is as little design as possible.” Vitra Design Museum’s interview with Dieter Rams places that phrase in the context of his broader thinking.
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For Rams, then, “less” is a decision about what an object needs—not a rule that every object should look bare. The Design Museum identifies Vitsœ’s 620 chair among the works associated with his practice, showing how the same concern for considered design extends beyond Braun products.
Charles and Ray Eames: design as a process of serving people
The Eameses approached design as a way to address overlapping needs rather than as a vehicle for a signature style alone. The Library of Congress describes their process this way: “For the Eameses, the design process would be successful only by identifying the overlapping needs of client, society, and designer and developing products that would serve all three.” This framing helps explain why their work crossed disciplines and why their influence is not limited to chairs. See the Library of Congress Eames exhibition and its biography of Charles and Ray Eames.
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Experiments with materials and technology during the Second World War fed into low-cost furniture for Herman Miller and later housing designs. Their work also included science exhibitions such as Mathematica and multimedia slide presentations. Those projects share an interest in making ideas usable and understandable, whether the medium was a chair, a house, or an exhibition.
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1Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteThe Library of Congress biography notes that the Eameses’ carefully catalogued slide collection contains approximately 350,000 slides; the page does not state a date for that figure. It is a measure of the collection’s scale, not a measure of the designers’ influence.
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Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel: clothing made for comfort and movement
Chanel’s practical approach challenged the conventions of women’s clothing. The Metropolitan Museum of Art explains that she worked with jersey when the fabric was unusual in women’s fashion and commonly associated with men’s underwear. Although jersey was initially inexpensive, its drape suited the simple, practical designs she wanted to make. Her sportswear and less constricting silhouettes offered an alternative to corsets and supported the practical activities women faced during wartime. The Met traces this history in its essay on Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel.
The V&A describes comfort, simplicity, and wearability as central to Chanel’s values. Jersey’s fluidity and suppleness helped clothes move with the wearer; the little black dress made versatility visible in a garment that could be worn from day into evening. Reporting on November 1916 coverage by American and British Vogue, the museum quotes the magazines: “Chanel is master of her art, and her art resides in jersey.” The historical quotation and the museum’s account appear in the V&A’s article on what makes Chanel iconic.
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Comfort did not make Chanel’s work anonymous. The Met says American Vogue compared her 1926 black dress to the Ford, anticipating its broad appeal, and describes the later Chanel suit as a signature style. In her work, practicality became a repeatable visual language.
Three routes to a lasting design idea
Rams made clarity and longevity central to the designed object. The Eameses developed a process attentive to the needs around a project and carried it across furniture, housing, and visual communication. Chanel used fabric and silhouette to make movement and comfort part of modern dress. Their ideas remain legible in what they made: restrained products and furniture, designs and exhibitions for varied audiences, and garments that joined practicality to a distinct look.
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