Maria Pergay

Maria Pergay: CompleteWorks 1957–2010 is the first comprehensive survey of the work of the legendary French furniture designer whose career now enters its sixth decade. Pergay is most renowned for her use of stainless steel, which she began exploring in 1968 with the now-iconic Flying Carpet Daybed and Ring Chair. Always pursuing her own design canon, she concurrently worked on custom projects for noted figures from Pierre Cardin to the Saudi Royal family. In the late 1980s through the 1990s, she produced several important commissions in Russia and continued to develop her innovative work in stainless steel, combining it to striking effect with mother of pearl, lacquer and precious woods. Her groundbreaking show in 2006 established her gallery presence in New York. Compiled with the designer’s collaboration, Maria Pergay: Complete Works 1957–2010 documents more than 50 years of creation. The only authoritative reference catalogue on the designer’s work, it presents detailed descriptions of more than 300 of Pergay’s designs accompanied by contemporary and vintage photographs, many of which have never previously been reproduced. Maria Pergay was born to Russian parents in Romania in 1930, emigrating to France at the age of seven. Pergay designed her first collection of contemporary silver objects in 1957, opening her own shop on Paris’ Place des Vosges in 1960. In 1968, her first group of stainless steel furniture was exhibited at Galerie Maison Jardin and gained her instant success. Pergay has since been sought after by sophisticated collectors for private commissions around the world, including Saudi Arabia and Russia. Since her major New York show in 2006, Pergay, now in her eighties, exhibits internationally, while continuing to create pieces for a growing audience of major collectors.