Stow & Davis was a Grand Rapids, Michigan furniture manufacturer known for its office and executive furniture. The company traces its origins to 1880, when Russell Stow and Thomas Haight formed the Stow and Haight Furniture Company; in 1885, George A. Davis purchased Haight’s interest and the firm became Stow & Davis [1]. In 1985, Steelcase, Inc. acquired the company, and all Steelcase wood products were subsequently sold under the Stow/Davis or Stow & Davis name [2].
Design and History
Stow & Davis’s logo from the 1950s until 1985 was a streamlined upper-case “S” attached to a “D” [3]. This monogram-style mark followed an earlier post-World War II treatment in which the “S” and “D” were printed in script, with lines above and below the name no longer connected to the letters [3].
In 1968, a new symbol for Stow & Davis was designed by William Tobias at Robert Miles Runyan’s design firm [4]. Runyan’s Los Angeles studio was known for corporate identity work, including logos for Transamerica Corp., Crown Zellerbach, Caesar’s Palace and Times Mirror Co. [5]. The 1968 Stow & Davis mark is categorized as a monogram design [4].
The company also registered trademarks for its word marks and monogram. A “STOW DAVIS” trademark was filed July 10, 1963, covering office furniture including desks, chairs, settees, sofas, tables, credenzas, cabinets and bookcases [6]. An “SD” mark was filed October 6, 1966, for the same categories of office furniture [7].
Following the 1985 Steelcase acquisition, the Stow & Davis name continued in use for wood products [2]. In 1992, the ampersand was dropped from the name, and the brand became Stow/Davis [8].
Meaning and Symbolism
The 1950s-1985 mark combined the company’s initials into a single streamlined form, with the upper-case “S” attached to the “D” [3]. The 1968 redesign by Tobias at Runyan’s firm continued the monogram approach [4]. No documented explanation of specific symbolic meaning beyond the initials has been located in available sources.
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