Flickr Widget

Friday, October 31, 2014

Milo Baughman

I started this blog September 6, 2010. Some of you have been readers since the beginning. Others have come on board later. From now through the end of the month, I'm going to be on a short blogging break. Not only am I in the middle of a big volunteer project, I'm also trying to help get the new store open, so I've decided share some of my favorite posts from the past four years. I'll throw in a few new photos for you longtime supporters who read the posts when they were first published.


(First posted 11/16/2010)

After studying architecture and product design at the Art Center School of Los Angeles and the California School of the Arts, Milo Baughman (1923-2003) took a job with the Frank Brothers department store as a salesman and a window dresser. On the side, he became involved with the influential publication Furniture Forum.

Glenn of California hired Baughman to design a new collection. Working mainly with walnut, Formica and wrought iron, Baughman created simple, understated pieces; many were conceived as space dividers, functioning admirably in the open plan interiors characteristic of the California Modern style.

In addition to Glenn of California, Baughman designed for a number of furniture companies starting in the mid-1940s until his death, including Mode Furniture, The Inco Company, Pacific Iron, Murray Furniture of Winchendon, Arch Gordon, Design Institute America, George Kovacs, Directional, Henredon and Drexel, among others. He is most famous, however, for his longtime association with Thayer Coggin of High Point, North Carolina.

After briefly running his own workshop, Baughman began a long association in 1953 with Thayer Coggin, a North Carolina furniture company that lasted until his death in 2003. His stylish furniture proved very popular with middle class consumers, and he quickly became a household name. Among his noteworthy designs for the company are the 820-400 chaise (1954) and the leather and chrome 951-103 arm chair (1962).

In 1969 he was invited by Brigham Young University to establish a Department of Environmental Design, where he continued as chairman and adjunct professor for several years, while continuing his design business. He moved to Virginia for twelve  years and later returned to BYU as a senior lecturer. He also lectured over the years at the Rhode Island School of Design, the Univertity of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Tennessee.

Baughman’s work was included in the Whitney Museums 1985 exhibit High Styles: Twentieth Century American Design. In recognition of his monumental impact on American taste, Baughman was inducted into the Furniture Designers Hall of Fame in 1987.

From lostcityarts.com, deseretnews.com and artnet.com


Desk for Glenn of California, 1949
1stdibs.com

Scoop chairs for Glenn of California, 1952
mid2mod.com

Credenza for Glenn of California, 1950s
1stdibs.com

Scoop chair for Glenn of California, 1952
redmodernfurniture.com

Drexel Perspective sideboard, 1952
1stdibs.com

Lounge chair and ottoman for Thayer Coggin, 1950s
1stdibs.com

951-103 arm chair for Thayer Coggin, 1962
eddenton.com

Sculpted chaise for Thayer Coggin, 1970
1stdibs.com

Recliner for Thayer Coggin, 1960s
mid2mod.com

Sectional and tables for Thayer Coggin, 1960s
antiquesmoderne.com

Lazy susan coffee table for Thayer Coggin, 1960s
Groovy Treasures (Antique Gallerry), Lewisville, TX


Update (10/31/14): After hearing countless debates about the pronunciation of Baughman's name, I contacted Brigham Young University and Thayer Coggin some time ago for a definitive answer. The jury is in (and a well qualified one, at that). The correct pronunciation is MY-low BOFF-man.


Thursday, October 30, 2014

Jens Risom

I started this blog September 6, 2010. Some of you have been readers since the beginning. Others have come on board later. From now through the end of the month, I'm going to be on a short blogging break. Not only am I in the middle of a big volunteer project, I'm also trying to help get the new store open, so I've decided share some of my favorite posts from the past four years. I'll throw in a few new photos for you longtime supporters who read the posts when they were first published.


(First posted 10/31/2010)

Jens Risom (1916- ) studied interior and furniture design at the Arts and Crafts Academy of Copenhagen, graduating in 1937. In 1939, he immigrated to the United States where he established himself as a proponent of the Scandinavian Modern style, which, at the time, had not yet achieved popularity.

That changed in 1940, when his design for a model house in New York's Rockefeller Center attracted widespread attention, generating both publicity and commissions, among them the distinction of being the first person invited to design furniture for Hans Knoll.

One of Risom's most recognizable designs is the birchwood chair (1941), which was made of molded birch and army surplus webbing. It is still in production today in a variety of colors. He is also known for his sculptural tables, chairs and sofas which had a lip that edged over an open base, giving the piece the illusion of floating.

After the Second World War, Risom founded his own furniture business, Jens Risom Design. He served as chief designer until 1973, when he sold his company to Dictaphone. He then moved to New Canaan, Connecticut, where he founded a consultancy studio called Design Control. It is still active.

From lostcityarts.com



Lounge chair
bonluxat.com

Bench
archiexpo.com

Credenza
1stdibs.com

Armchairs
1stdibs.com

Magazine table
1stdibs.com

Slipper chair
1stdibs.com

3-seater sofa
1stdibs.com

Chair and ottoman
1stdibs.com

Side table
1stdibs.com

Love seat
1stdibs.com

Risom's Rhode Island residence
dwell.com

Interior of Risom residence
dwell.com

knoll.com

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Eva Zeisel

I started this blog September 6, 2010. Some of you have been readers since the beginning. Others have come on board later. From now through the end of the month, I'm going to be on a short blogging break. Not only am I in the middle of a big volunteer project, I'm also trying to help get the new store open, so I've decided share some of my favorite posts from the past four years. I'll throw in a few new photos for you longtime supporters who read the posts when they were first published.


(First posted 10/28/2010)

Ceramics designer Eva Zeisel (1906-) began a prolific career in her late teens and continues to create innovative pieces even today. She was born in Budapest and pursued a career in painting, studying at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, but left in search of a more craft-oriented trade. She was apprenticed to a ceramist and soon became one of the first female journeyman potters.

In 1932 Zeisel moved to Russia, drawn by the folk art and the peasant customs that still thrived there. She was forced to leave by the increasingly hostile attitudes towards foreigners. In 1938 she moved to England and married Hans Zeisel. The couple immigrated to the United States in late 1938. One of Zeisel's first commissions in America was designing giftware for the Bay Ridge Specialty Company. When she started teaching at Pratt in 1939, a position she held until 1953, she arranged an innovative apprenticeship for her students through Bay Ridge, offering them a unique opportunity to gain professional experience.

In 1942, after the MoMA's Organic Design in Home Furnishings exhibit, the Castleton Company asked the museum to find a ceramist who could design a series that would define a new era of modern china. Zeisel was chosen, and her 1946 Museum series was unveiled. She followed this line with the colorful and playful 1946 Town and Country dinnerware for Red Wing Pottery (shown in my October 26 post). Another acclaimed series was Tomorrow's Classic for Charles Seliger.

Zeisel retired from mass-produced commercial design in the mid 1960s. She kept creating her own work, however, and celebrated her 100th birthday by designing her first teapot for Chantal of Texas in 2006. Asked about her continued work, she said, “My new designs reflect, as always, my playful search for beauty.” And she adamantly refuses to say she's "still working," which she thinks implies what she's doing is unusual. According to Zeisel, she's just doing what she's always done...being a "maker of things."

From r20thcentury.com and oneartworld.com



jeremybales.blogspot.com

Museum pattern
brooklynmuseum.org

Hallcraft pitcher
srandsgallery.com

Tomorrow's Classic
midmodmom.com

Baby oil pourer
brooklynmuseum.org

Town and Country cruet
lacma.org

Screen
jasonleedesign.com

Town and Country
bostonglobe.com

Vase
veniceclayartists.com

Duck tea set
modish.net

Chantal kettle
designed to celebrate her 100th birthday
craftcouncil.org

wizzley.com

designobserver.com


Update: Eva Zeisel died in 2011 at the age of 105. At the time this post was written, she was still alive.


Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Julius Shulman

I started this blog September 6, 2010. Some of you have been readers since the beginning. Others have come on board later. From now through the end of the month, I'm going to be on a short blogging break. Not only am I in the middle of a big volunteer project, I'm also trying to help get the new store open, so I've decided share some of my favorite posts from the past four years. I'll throw in a few new photos for you longtime supporters who read the posts when they were first published.


(First posted 11/9/2012)

Julius Shulman (1910-2009) was perhaps the most famous and most talented American photographer of modernist architecture. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, but the family moved to a farm in Connecticut soon afterward. It was there that Shulman's love of nature and the awareness of light and shadow began to influence his future career choice.

When Shulman was 10, the family moved to Los Angeles. He graduated from Roosevelt High School, where he took his only course in photography. After being what he termed "an academic drifter" for seven years at UCLA and UC Berkeley, he left college without a degree.

In 1936, just two weeks after leaving Berkeley, a man who was renting a room from Shulman's sister invited him along to see a Richard Neutra's Kun House. Shulman always carried a camera with him and took photos of the house. The man, who worked as a draftsman for Neutra, showed the photographs to the architect, who sent for the young Shulman and ordered more prints.

As a result of this chance meeting with Neutra, Shulman met other prominent architects, such as Rafael Soriano and Rudolph Schindler. After serving in World War II, Shulman came home to find himself in even more demand than before the war. Of the two dozen Case Study homes designed by such architects as Charles Eames, Craig Ellwood, A. Quincy Jones, Pierre Koenig, Neutra and Soriano, Shulman took photographs of 18.

Before his 70-year career ended, he also photographed the houses of Gregory Ain, Frank Lloyd Wright, John Lautner, Eero Saarinen, Albert Frey, Frank Gehry, Harwell Harris and many others. His work was contained in virtually every book published on modernist architects.

The image of Koenig's Case Study House #22, which was built for Carlotta and Buck Stahl, was the photograph that would secure Shulman's reputation and career. The black-and-white image, taken from outside the house as the sun was setting May 9, 1960, shows two pretty women dressed for a special night out, but for the moment, sitting and chatting. The image became an iconic snapshot of the good life.

Always generous with what he knew about his profession, Shulman for decades conducted seminars in photography at USC, UCLA and other universities. He was awarded the American Institute of Architecture's Gold Medal for architectural photography in 1969.

When Shulman was well into his 90s, a three-volume set called Modernism Rediscovered was published by Taschen. The set features more than 400 of his architectural projects.

From latimes.com and metropolismag.com


Neutra's Kun House
la.curbed.com

Eames/Saarinen's Entenza Residence
metropolismag.com

Soriano's Krause Residence
metropolismag.com

Gehry's Steeves Residence
metropolismag.com

Ain's Wilfong Residence
metropolismag.com

Koenig's Stahl House (Case Study House #22)
juliusshulmanfilm.com

Neutra's Kronish House
archpaper.com

Shulman at work
siongchin.com

Shulman staging a shot with branches and plants
anthonylukephotography.blogspot.com

Shulman with Richard Neutra
marinachetner.com

Shulman at work in later years
viewfromaloft.org

If you haven't seen the documentary Visual Acoustics, I recommend that you visit the film site to learn more about the available DVD or about screening dates on the Sundance Channel and elsewhere.