How Fake Iconic Furniture Ruined Kim Kardashian’s Week

Kim Kardashian is in legal hot water — again — for making dubious claims about products online. This time, it centers on one of the most exclusive pieces of American furniture released in the last fifty years.

If you’re already confused about the premise of the story, you’re not alone, nor are you high. Here’s a rundown of the strange controversy capturing the design community’s attention.

The controversy stems from a video in which Kardashian claimed the company owned a very rare and expensive table set. It was actually a knock off

The reality TV star turned business mogul posted a video titled “Welcome to My Office! Official Skkn by Kim Office Tour” in August of 2022, which has since been taken down due to recent legal action, though you can still find it via a quick Google search elsewhere. 

The nearly 13-minute video featured Kardashian giving viewers a behind the scenes look at her makeup company SKKN BY KIM’s meticulously designed California office space. Roughly 2:28 into the video, she walks into the company’s kitchen and eating space while drawing particular attention to a distinctive table and chairs. As Kardashian states, “If you guys are furniture people because I’ve really gotten into furniture lately, these Donald Judd tables are really amazing and totally blend in with the seats.” 

To those unfamiliar with Donald Judd’s work, the statement could have easily been dismissed as another random Kardashian flex. But her word choice has now sparked a lawsuit. 

Kim Kardashian and the office table’s maker are now being sued for trademark and copyright infringement

This week, the Judd Foundation, which “maintains and preserves Donald Judd’s permanently installed living and working spaces, libraries, and archives in New York and Marfa, Texas” and is led by his daughter Rainer Judd,  filed a lawsuit against Kardashian as well as California-based Clements Design, the maker of the knockoffs at the center of the dispute. 

Clements Design states that the Judd Foundation’s claims are unfounded. Specifically, they have called out that various design details make their table and chairs distinct, including the furniture’s dimensions and wood types, which differ from Judd’s original designs.

To counter these claims, the Judd Foundation has called out details in an invoice from Clements Design for the furniture. The document in question apparently references Donald Judd by name when describing the SKKN BY KIM office furniture as and also includes an image of an authentic Donald Judd dining set as a point of reference. The foundation believes this is evidence that both Kardashian and Clements Design were aware that the table set copied Judd’s work.

The Judd Foundation’s official statement makes their point of view on the matter crystal clear: “Ms. Kardashian’s furniture is irrefutably fake. The existence of inauthentic furniture undermines the integrity of his original work.”

The Foundation’s statement also frames this situation in a broader context as an existential threat to all creators. “If creators’ works can simply be usurped with no repercussions and exploited by other people,” said Rainer Judd, “what will be the protection for artists and designers to further create in the future?” 

The specific Judd designed table in question is available by commission only and costs $90,000 by itself

The table and chairs shown in the SKKN BY KIM office tour video appear to copy Judd’s La Mansana Table 22 and Chair 84 designs, shown in the Instagram posts below, which represent “two of Mr. Judd’s most well-known designs,” according to the lawsuit.

The Washington Post states that the table retails for $90,000, while each chair costs $9,000. The story also notes that both items are sold exclusively via custom order. The New York Times reports adds that only three authentic table copies have been sold in the last 15 years.

The Judd Foundation attempted to clear up the matter directly before filing a lawsuit

Multiple news outlets have reported that the Judd Foundation initially contacted Kardashian’s representatives shortly after the original video was published. They requested that Kardashian’s team delete the video, “recycle” (re: obliterate) the existing table, and issue a public statement about the furniture not being authentic. They also offered to sell Kardashian authentic versions of the tables and chairs at a discount.

Neither party could ultimately come to an amicable settlement of the issue, so the matter has now escalated into a formal lawsuit.

So who exactly is Donald Judd?

Judd was an American artist, writer, and designer primarily known for his “minimalist” aesthetic (though Judd apparently opposed associating his work with the generic label). His work has and still appears in some of the finest museums in the world, including The Art Institutes of Chicago, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tate Modern, and Guggenheim. 

In 1996, the Judd Foundation was formed to preserve the spaces he helped design and create in Marfa, Texas, and New York City. 

What’s the story behind Donald Judd’s furniture?

Judd’s interest in furniture began, at least partially, out of a need to furnish his own spaces, says the Judd Foundation. In his retrospective essay, It’s Hard to Find a Good Lamp, written in 1993, Judd recounted the primary frustrations that led him to design furniture in the early 80s in a single paragraph.

“It’s impossible to go to the store and buy a chair. In North America since the ‘Mission’ style became unfashionable in the 1920s and in England since the similar furniture derived from William Morris also became unfashionable, there has been no furniture which is pleasurable to look at, fairly available, and moderate in price,” he wrote. 

Later in the same essay, Judd added, “Almost all furniture made since the 1920s and much before in any of the ‘styles,’ ‘modern’ and ‘traditional,’ has been junk for consumers.”

To address the problems Judd saw with the existing furniture market, he began designing beds, shelves, tables, and chairs out of a standard unit of lumber — one-by-twelves — that were simple and functional in their approach. He also soon moved into creating similar designs made from metal. 

The quality of the furniture’s materials, either wood or metal, their ease of use, and the simplicity of their construction were the factors Judd valued above all else. 

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