In 1973, American Seating asked Acton to research the furniture needs of the burgeoning college market. “Colleges were upgrading to a more human level,” Acton recalled. “They didn’t want straight-backed chairs, they wanted chairs to think in.” This dovetailed nicely with a design already forming on his drawing table; it became the Acton Stacker, introduced in 1975, with its distinctive Z profile that forms the arms and the legs with a single steel tube. A huge success, the chair is still in production.

Over two decades, starting in 1969, Acton transformed the family’s 1940s Colonial-style farmhouse into a sprawling contemporary clad in brick, cedar and glass. His furniture plays a prominent role in every room, joining pieces by Charles and Ray Eames, Harry Bertoia and Warren Platner. Outside, set into the brickwork above the front door, is a hand-hammered copper panel, one of several Acton made for his home; his totem-like sculptures dot the hilly property. The sculptures occasionally appear at modernism shows, and, inspired by his daughter, Tana, a Santa Fe-based jewelry designer, he has also introduced lines of jewelry in crumpled copper, crumpled silver and silver wire.

Interestingly, Acton, the modernist, has always looked to the ideas of Aristotle, which he studied as an undergraduate, to guide his work. “There is a form that everyone can participate in,” he explained. “There is such a thing as ‘chairness.’ I am constantly trying to eliminate the superfluous, but at the same time define the purpose of an object.” 

Dan Obermaier is a freelance writer. He and his wife, Jill, a photography teacher, have collected and studied midcentury modern design for more than 20 years.