18 December, 2007

Hans J. Wegner: A Danish modern icon

The year 2007 marked the passing of a great furniture designer Hans J. Wegner. He was born in Tonder in Denmark in 1914 and became known as the most successful and prominent personality in the modern Danish design school. His style is based on clean and simple lines that together are beautiful and quiet.

Hans J. Wegner began as a painter, but had his career interrupted by a time millitärtjänstgöring. He was educated at a technical school and later wrote in on Copenhagen's Academy of Architecture in addition to vocational school for arts and crafts. Later he worked under Erik Moller and Arne Jacobsen ( http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arne_Jacobsen ).

He specialized chair designs, which he preferred to see the artwork as something useful to sit on. One of his well-known philosophies was that a chair should look very good from all sides and that there should be a back of the chair. He wanted very basic and processed forms, but used many different shapes and materials in their preferences.

He defined not work for quite simple chairs, but made intricate designs such as the peacock style for design contests, and even some beds, cupboards and tables. He created a valet chair after using himself as guinea pig for how it looked and how well it did its intended job. Together with his daughter, he is deemed also to have invented the pole lights in the 1970s.

Most Furniture Hans J. Wegner is known for are chairs. One of his more famous designs were ch 25 (or Chair 25/Chair 25) that he created the 1950th He designed four chairs with woven seats for Carl Hansen & Son , but that's the only time he used repväv for both seat and backrest. It is also unique scheduled by the front chair legs which are very straight and supports the majority of the weight. The rear legs are angled and this lounge chair is much more stable than many of the same type.

Seat 25 was made in several different types of wood and had a pappersrep used for both the backrest and seat. Another interesting part of the design is that the seat side remains a bent part that gets to the rear chair legs. Many find the chair 25 looks very much like woven wicker furniture and is often used with them. Although it is Wegner's chair in a completely different league than the feeble basket weave.

Hans J Wegner did not give their designs a few names, only the directory number. One of his models, PP503, was seen by millions when a dozen of them were bought by broadcasters and used in the famous Kennedy-Nixon election debate 1960th They were chosen for their simple, clean lines, but all of them are also comfortable.

Hans J. Wegner