Ray Komai was a Japanese American; he was a graphic, industrial and interior designer. He studied in Los Angeles at the Art Center College.

He settled in New York in 1944, where he worked in advertising and set up a graphic design and advertising office (with Carter Winter). J.G. Furniture created Komai’s 1949 moulded plywood chair with a split seat and bent metal legs. They produced his other designs of chairs, tables and upholstered seating as well.

He set up his architecture practice in New York in 1905 and, after visiting the 1925 Paris ‘Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes.’ He began offering interior design services. In 1931, he became a professor of interior architecture at New York University. He sold his own and imported textiles and furniture and Maurice Heaton’s glassware in the gallery he established.

He set up his workshop at 12 rue Saint-Bernard in Paris, where he produced cabinets, rugs, drawings, and paintings. In 1930, he rendered the interior scheme of the boudoir of the Princesse de la Tour d’Auvergne in the Château de Grosbois, the private office of Jeanne Lanvin, the reception salon of Field Marshal Lyautey, and the arrangement of the Musée de la France d’Outre-Mer on the occasion of the 1931 Paris ‘Exposition Coloniale. 

Vlastislav Hofman (1884 – 1964) was a Czech architect, designer and artist. He studied at the Czech Technical University. He worked in the building department of the Prague magistrate. He was a member of the Artel Cooperative and Mánes Association of Plastic Artists. In 1911 he left Mánes and joined the group of plastic artists. He wrote a number of theoretical articles for magazines. In 1912, he left the group and returned to Mánes.