Eszter Haraszty

Background

Haraszty was born in Hungary and received her education from the Hungarian University of Fine Arts in Budapest.

Career

After Hans Knoll saw her portfolio, he hired her as a textiles designer at his company, Knoll, where she began working under Marianne Strengell. In 1949, Haraszty was appointed director of KnollTextiles (the Knoll textiles department), a position she held until 1955. Her designs were very colorful and often floral.

She was best known for her Iceland poppy motif.

Under Haraszty, KnollTextiles explored then-novel fabrics, such as nylon. In addition to her work at Knoll, Haraszty consulted at Victor Gruen Associates and International Business Machines Corporation, as well as designing a line of women"s clothing for B.H. Wragge.

As a lecturer at University of California, Los Angeles, Haraszty taught a course called "Design From Nature."

Many of her prints and textile samples are now part of museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Artist Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

The Victoria and Albert Museum.

And the Château Dufresne.

Achievements

• Over the course of her career, Haraszty was awarded five gold medals from the Association of Interior Designers for her textile designs, as well as an award from the Pasadena Art Museum.