Despite its popularity, the origins of knolling are quite young. The word is believed to have been coined in 1987 by Andrew Kromelow, who, at the time, was a janitor in Frank Gehry’s Santa Monica studio. 

Gehry himself was working on furniture designs for Knoll, the US furniture manufacturer whose reputation was founded on the boxy, modernist designs of Florence Knoll.

Perhaps in a gesture of respect to Knoll’s angular designs, or as the result of an obsessive impulse, Kromelow set out to organize the tools that weren't being used at the studio and laid them out at the right angles to each other and to the edges of the work surfaces.

It allowed the worker to see all the tools at once and to easily understand sizes and uses, everything seen in relation to everything else.

Tom Sachs, who was also working in Gehry’s furniture studio at the same time, adopted the method, and it was Sachs who formulated the first "rules" of knolling.

Here is a scan of a page from his notebook (1989) in which he describes how to aesthetically keep your belongings:

• Scan your environment for materials, tools, books, music, etc. which are not in use.
• Put away everything not in use. If you aren't sure, leave it out.
• Group all 'like' objects.
• Align or square all objects to either the surface they rest on, or the studio itself.

Today, we see knolling in many places but some people also call it 'flat lays. '

Reddit aside, Instagram is awash in knolling too. Then there are various catalogs and product photography, commercials, and, of course, Apple stores!