Syrie Maugham represented several of the most renowned designers and artists of her time, including Jean-Michel Frank and Diego Giacometti, whose works she retailed to decorators like David Adler and Frances Elkins. To this day, she is heavily associated with many of these figures, though especially with Serge Roche who made the fanciful and classical plaster decorations that she prized.

The present form is known as a ‘Knole’ sofa, named after the early seventeenth-century original at Knole House in Kent. The sofa type is defined by its fat sides of the same height, which are held together by rope tied around the finials on each corner which can be loosened to adjust the pitch of the sides. It is one of the oldest sofa forms recorded, as previously seating design was limited to benches and chairs.