Just ahead of San Francisco Design Week (June 2–10), a new exhibition unpacks the last decade of Charles and Ray Eames’s furniture, and it’s only in town until January.
“Past as Prologue: The Last Decade of Furniture Design by Charles and Ray Eames (1968–1978)” opens this week in the freshly restored Transamerica Pyramid, running through early January.
In the canon of design duos, there’s no overstating Charles and Ray Eames. From molded plywood chairs to multimedia exhibitions, they pushed mid-century America into modernity, and kept iterating until Charles’s death in 1978.
Curated by their granddaughter Llisa Demetrios for the Eames Institute of Infinite Curiosity, the show zooms in on their final ten years: ergonomic office prototypes, re-engineered classics, and sketches that document six-day workweeks in their Los Angeles studio. Some pieces have never been displayed; others are familiar but rendered lighter, stronger, more democratic.
Timing is everything. With San Francisco Design Week drawing the global design set, the Pyramid’s concrete and glass backdrop underscores how forward-thinking those late Eames experiments still feel. An online companion lets distant fans browse, but the full-scale plywood and polished aluminum deserve a real-world encounter.
Two retail outposts sweeten the visit. The lobby stocks vintage and re-edition furniture; the gallery shop offers catalogs, books, and small keepsakes, proof that good ideas travel well.
“Past as Prologue: The Last Decade of Furniture Design by Ray and Charles Eames (1968–1978)” runs through early January. Consider this your calendar reminder: some legacies don’t wait around.
Exhibition Details
• Where: Transamerica Pyramid Center, 600 Montgomery St., San Francisco
• When: Opens June 7 2025 (Design Week kick-off) and is slated to stay up into early January; check the Institute’s site for exact end-date.
• Hours & Tickets: Wednesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.–5 p.m.; admission is free, but timed slots are recommended, reserve at eamesinstitute.org.
