23 January, 2008

Poul Henningsen - A Danish designers' life and biography

Poul Henningsen became Denmark's first expert in lighting theory. He was also an eminent cultural and literary personalities during his lifetime. Although he was a man of much talent and knowledge, he is best known for his lamps. His impact on home and kontorsbelysnings shape, style and culture can be seen today.

To get insight in Henningsen's work is an examination of his early years and help. Poul Henningsen was born in 1894, the son of a writer and a satirist. He spent a pleasant childhood in an open-minded home, with regular contact with visiting writers and highly educated. A special thing about his childhood was that it was lit by electric light, but instead the soft glow of gas lamps. It was of course the norm for small-town life without electricity at the turn of the century.

When he was old enough, he began a formal education and training at the Technical School and the Danish Technical University. He studied and trained for a few years to become an architect but took no formal qualification. Nevertheless he still managed to get some private and commercial works as a freelance architect in Copenhagen. He also wrote for several newspapers, magazines and theaters.

When he is frequented buildings with electric lights became Poul Henningsen frightened of form and function with these lights. He disliked how they got their surroundings look and feel. He felt that his time lighting appeared to be ugly, hard, brilliant and quite unpleasant to experience.

Poul Henningsen

As a result, he experimented with creating new lighting variations to produce softer, atmospheric lighting. In 1924 he designed the first multi-nuanced light, the prototype for what would later be known as PH-lamp. He debuted with some of his designs at the 1925 exhibition of decorative arts in Paris and won first prize for modern lighting. PH-model became very popular and put into production shortly thereafter.

He created the lighting, which distributed and filtered light through the clever positioning of the lamp shades. He adapted to their size and shape to fit its function. His lamp shades covering the bulb and directs light downward to create soft information, in order to achieve a bright atmosphere of relaxing comfort.