Warren McArthur (1885-1981) was born into a prosperous Chicago family. He graduated from Cornell in 1908 and in 1913 he moved to Phoenix to work with his brother Charles. With their father’s (Warren McArthur Sr.) encouragement and backing they became prominent and commissioned their older brother Albert Chase McArthur (1881-1951) to design a resort hotel for them in Phoenix, the Arizona Biltmore, which opened in 1929. The Biltmore needed chairs that could be used indoors and out and Warren McArthur provided the answer… Aluminum Furniture.
In 1929 he moved to Los Angeles, California to begin making aluminum furniture. In 1930 he founded the Warren McArthur Corporation, which produced his “streamlined” chairs, tables, and other consumer goods. He used interchangeable external anodized parts and fittings with an inner steel structure for stability. Instead of hiding the fittings, McArthur boldly made them part of the design.
Despite success in Los Angeles with the motion picture studios, high-class restaurants and stars, McArthur, at the height of the Great Depression, moved his company and production facilities to Rome, New York. In the late fall of 1933 he opened a showroom in New York City. In 1938 the company moved to Bantam, Connecticut where at the beginning of World War II they switched to production of airplane seats. After the war, The McArthur Corporation struggled and declared bankruptcy in 1948. Warren McArthur died in 1981.