Michael van Beuren was born in New York and studied architecture at the prestigious Bauhaus school in Germany, under Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Josef Albers until its closure in 1933. He moved to Acapulco at the end of 1936, where he oversaw the interiors  of the bungalows at the renowned Flamingo Hotel in 1937, and quickly became a formative member of the Mexican Modernism movement.

By 1938, Van Beuren began focusing on furniture design, working with a fellow Bauhaus colleague, Klaus Grabe, to create modern and affordable pieces. Inspired by the local culture and craftsmanship, the duo applied quintessentially modernist design principles to popular Mexican mainstays, such as woven reclining chaises and wooden dining chairs. Their approach was a success; the pair was one of the winners of a 1941 competition organised by MoMA targeting teams from Latin America called Organic Design in Home Furnishings, which catapulted them to wide regard. In the following years, Van Beuren founded his furniture label DOMUS with his brother Freddie, an engineer, which became synonymous with well crafted, modernist design that garnered fans both in Mexico and America. Along with his own designs, DOMUS also produced work by Clara Porset, a friend and contemporary of Van Beuren’s. Michael van Beuren continued designing until eventually selling the company at the end of the 1970’s. He retired to Cuernavaca, where he died in 2004.

Today his furniture represents one of the most fruitful moments of furniture production in Mexico and has become an essential part of Mexican 20th century design history.