Sayl® Chair by Herman Miller®
designed by Yves Béhar

Need a chair today? Check out the Sayl Chairs we have in stock here.  Also, if you don't see a color or option here, please call our sales team at (877) 977-0989!

Features:

Y-Tower: The chair’s distinctive structure provides the connection points for the suspension back. It is the foundation of the chair’s distinctive arc, which mirrors the curvature of the spine.

3D Intelligent Suspension: Sayl’s unframed back uses elastomer strands that vary in thickness and tension to target support along the spine while encouraging a full range of seated movement.

Tilt: 

• Tilt Limiter: Limits the recline range to one of three settings: slight, mid-, and full-recline. The tilt tension control lets you adjust the amount of effort needed to recline comfortably while feeling balanced and supported.
• Tilt Limiter with Seat Angle Adjustment: Limits the recline range to one of three settings: slight, mid-, and full-recline. The tilt tension control lets you adjust the amount of effort needed to recline comfortably while feeling balanced and supported. Seat Angle Adjustment changes the angle of the seat from horizontal to a 5-degree forward tilt for people who sit at a slightly forward angle as they work.

Lumbar Support: 

• Non-Adjustable Back Support: Fixed lumbar support offers stationary support in the lumbar region of your back and also includes built in passive PostureFit (molded into the backrest), which properly supports the base of your spine, or sacral region, helping your pelvis maintain a natural forward tilt.
• Adjustable Lumbar Support: The adjustable lumbar support adjusts vertically over a 4 inch range to support the natural curve of your midback, or lumbar region. In addition, there is built in passive PostureFit (molded into the backrest), which properly supports the base of your spine, or sacral region, helping your pelvis maintain a natural forward tilt. Recommended for people who like to work in a reclined posture.

Seat Depth: 

• Fixed Seat Depth: Seat pan is fixed at 16 inches and cannot be adjusted.
• Adjustable Seat Depth: Seat pan adjusts from a depth of 16 inches to 18 inches to fully support your thighs without putting pressure on the back of your knees.

Arm Adjustability: 

• Fixed Arms: Arms are set at 9.4 inches above the seat and cannot be adjusted. Ideal for short term use areas like conference rooms, multi-guest workspaces, and more.
• Height Adjustable Arms: Height Adjustable Arms adjust from 6.8 inches to 10.8 inches above the seat. This gives you the ability to support your arms at a comfortable height without straining your shoulders.
• Adjustable Arms: Adjustable Arms feature 4-way adjustable armpads that can be adjusted 4 inches vertically (6.8 inches to 10.8 inches from the seat to the top of the armpad), 1.25 inches horizontally, 2 inches front to back, and a pivot range of 11 degrees inward and 11 degrees outward.

Casters: 

• Casters for Carpet: Designed for use on low- to medium-pile carpet, such as commercial or Berber, this 2.5-inch diameter caster has wheels of durable black nylon.
• Casters for Hard Floor or Carpet: A versatile caster that can be used on hard surfaces such as wood, ceramic tile, vinyl tile, or carpeted floors, it is 2.5 inches in diameter and is made of durable black nylon with a soft polyurethane tread. The Soft tread gives the chair better traction and reduces noise on hard surfaces.

Dimensions & Measurements

• Overall Width: 24.5”
• Back Height: 33.75” to 40.75”
• Seat Width: 19.75”
• Seat Height: 15.5” to 20”
• Seat Depth: 26”
• Arm Height: 24” to 29”

Shipping Information

• Packaging Dimensions: 40.5” x 28” x 28.5”
• Package Weight: 38 lbs

Product Brochure

Sayl Chair Product Brochure

Beauty, elegance, respect

We asked designer Yves Béhar to design a highly affordable chair that would incorporate everything Herman Miller is known for—beautiful design, first-class ergonomics, elegant engineering, and respect for the environment.

Suspending a chair

Béhar, who calls San Francisco home, began by looking at designs that deliver the most with the least. And then he took a look at his city’s best-known landmark: the Golden Gate Bridge. Béhar wondered, could the engineering principles of a suspension bridge be applied to a chair?

The notion of using a suspension tower to support an unframed suspension back meant that the elastomer material could be stretched in a way that provides the greatest tension at points where support is needed and the least in areas that would allow for the most expansive range of motion.

Something unique

So why “Sayl”, rather than, say, “Bridge”? Take a look at the chair from the side. See the resemblance to a full mainsail? The name reflects the sailing vessels that pass beneath the bridges that inspired the original design. Replacing the “i” in “sail” with a “y” is a nod to the innovative Y-Tower structure of the work chair.

DESIGNERS

Yves Béhar

Yves Béhar is a thinker. And one thing he thinks about a lot is the future. You can see it in his designs—from his reflective red-lacquered laptop for Toshiba to his elegant closed-toe Footprints for Birkenstock to his refined Aliph Jawbone Headset for cell phones. “I believe design’s purpose is not only to show us the future, but to bring us the future,” he states.

The founder of fuseproject (“dedicated to the emotional experience of brands through storytelling”), Béhar has been exploring the design world since his childhood in Switzerland. “In Europe, it is double nature to evaluate objects based on how they work and how they look,” he explains.

Béhar grew up in a bicultural home, influenced by his East German mother and Turkish father. “One is functional and modernist and the other, expressive and poetic,” he says. “I always try to marry the two in my projects."

For a relatively young designer, he has had a remarkable career. A graduate of the Art Center College of Design, he started out working with high tech Silicon Valley clients such as Apple and Hewlett Packard, eventually gravitating into the sport, apparel, technology, and furniture arenas.

“In Europe, it is double nature to evaluate objects based on how they work and how they look” - Yves Béhar

One of the countless magazine articles written about Béhar called him “the multi-disciplinary designer of our time.” His long list of awards includes the prestigious National Design Award from the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian National Design Museum, where his work is part of their permanent collection.

In 2004 he had two solo exhibitions, one at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the other at the Musee de Design et D’arts Appliques Contemporains in Lausanne, Switzerland.

“When working with clients, my philosophy is to connect emotionally through ideas and content rather than style,” says Béhar. “It’s less about this or that aesthetic and more about meaningful conversations where people come to agreement in terms of approach and direction.”

His collaboration with Herman Miller came about through one such conversation. An admirer of Charles and Ray Eames, Béhar decided he wanted to do something for the company himself. “Design is very much at the center of Herman Miller’s culture,” he says. “So one day I just picked up the phone, called them, and said, ‘Let’s work together.’”

Four years later, Herman Miller introduced his two brilliantly innovative lighting products, Leaf and Ardea.

Given the wide range of products he works on, it would seem that Béhar might have a hard time escaping thoughts of design. Not at all, he says. “I have many outside interests that keep me balanced. For example, I love surfing, windsurfing, and snowboarding. So I spend a lot of time in the natural world, too.”

As for his future, Béhar says he’s very content designing products for companies who are “looking for departure, change, transformation. I’m continually excited working with people who want to move forward into the future and onto the next generation.”

From all indications, this is the man who can take them there.

OFFICIAL HERMAN MILLER RETAILER

We're an authorized Herman Miller retailer. This means we're official. We sell new factory-direct items complete with Herman Miller's own 12-year warranty. You can purchase confidently from Smart Furniture knowing you'll be receiving genuine Herman Miller product.

BRAND STORY

Herman Miller® is a pioneer in the furniture industry, an innovator whose human-centered, problem-solving approach to design has introduced new ways of living and working for over 100 years. Environmentally-friendly design, lean manufacturing, ergonomics, the open office, even American modernism itself: Herman Miller and our designers have had a hand in shaping it all. In the spirit of our founder, D.J. De Pree, who established a willingness to abandon ourselves creatively to the influence of others, we’ve partnered with the world’s leading designers for generations—from midcentury icons George Nelson, Charles and Ray Eames, and Alexander Girard to Michael Anastassiades, Scholten & Baijings, Yves Béhar, and more of today’s leading design minds. Our work with them continues to explore design as a method of change, and the enriching value authenticity brings to our lives. Together, we’re shaping the new kinds of spaces where people will live and work for years to come.

Adjustment Instructions

Sayl Chair Adjustment Instructions

Herman Miller Warranty

General Warranty

Care Instructions

Sayl Chair Care Instructions