From the FAB blog: In honor of this week’s Fab sale with the illustrious Eames Office design house, filmmaker Eames Demetrios—the grandson of Ray and Charles Eames—has shared some insights about the objects within in, and how design exists at all price points and aesthetic levels. Read on to enjoy some original Eames.

In our family, Charles and Ray were always teaching us by example. And one thing they understood very deeply was the difference between cost and worth. They were as delighted by the good design of the super ball as the SX-70: very different costs, equally worthwhile. After the last auction, some folks wished we had more rare collectibles, while others wondered what bargains we had. So, we are trying something new with this auction. We have both.

The Computer House of Cards is an extraordinary object. It is no longer in production (in fact, they were only made once, for the Osaka World’s Fair, and these are from the Eames Office at that time), so it is a real piece of history. You can admire it on many levels, but I suspect that one way in particular will endure. It is a deeply aesthetic exploration of a pivotal moment in human history: the transition between the analog age of computers and the digital and everything that made possible, including this website.

[Eames Office CFO Ric Keefer took one set and framed it, look at the great result here]

Charles’ eye captures the beauty of those analogue computers, not romantically, but matter of factly. We have no plans to reintroduce them, but someday we might. However, even if we do, if you get one of these, you’ll have a deck from the first production, that lived at 901 as Charles and Ray and Eames Office worked away on their projects.

So yes, those are pricey. But we have some other treasures—almost as fun as a super ball, and certainly an excellent value too: books and images and even some toys we have released more recently so you can hold some of Charles and Ray’s ideas and visions in your hands.

Let’s give Charles the last word. Here he talks about something that I think everyone in this community understands: that aesthetics can be a part of function. Where Charles and Ray excelled was being sure aesthetics were only one aspect of the function of their designs.

“The ultimate performance of a building or product is a measure of the way it has functioned, how could we damn a work because it has served mankind too well? If the telephone on our desk is a pleasure to look at and if it feels good and if it smells good and if it tastes good, and when you put it down on the receiver, it sounds good, if it adds to the sort of enrichment of our life, isn’t that the way in which it is functioning for us? Isn’t it serving us better; isn’t it functioning a little better? Then is there any possible way it could serve us better if it would function less?” —Charles Eames

Here are some of the items available at FAB during this sale.