Articles

The year 2007 marked the passing of a great furniture designer, Hans J Wegner. He was born in Tonger, Denmark in 1914 and became recognized as the most successful and prominent figure in the Danish Modern School of Design. His style is based on clean and simple lines that work together to be beautiful and unobtrusive.

Hans J Wegner started out in carpentry, but that was interrupted by service in the military. Following this he trained in a technical school, later enrolling at Copenhagen Architectural Academy, as well as the School of Arts and Crafts for his professional training. Later on he worked under Erik Moller and Arne Jacobsen, both masters in the field.

His specialty was the construction of chairs, which he liked to think of as a work of art as well as something useful to sit upon. One of his well known philosophies was that a chair should look great from every side and that there should be no "back" but rather a flow around the chair. He wanted very simple and refined designs, but employed many different shapes and materials within his preferences.

He did not stop at basic chairs, though, going in to more complex designs like the 'peacock' style for competitions as well as some designs for tables, beds, and cabinets. He also created a valet chair, he used himself to design the chair to make certain that it both looked good and did the job it was intended for. He is also considered, along with his daughter, to be the inventor of the pole light, which came around in the 1970's.

Most of the furniture (wegner möbler) Hans J Wegner is best known for is in fact chairs. One of the better known designs was the ch 25 (or Chair 25) created in 1950. He designed four chairs with woven style seats for Carl Hansen and Son, but this is the only one with rope weaving in both the seat and in the back. It is also uniquely engineered with the front legs being very straight and carrying most of the load. The back legs are angled and this lounge chair is much more stable than most of that type.

Chair 25 was made in several different woods and had a paper rope used for the back and seat. Another interesting part of the design is that the side of the seat is one continuous curved piece that becomes the back legs. Many people think Chair 25 looks a lot like wicker furnishings, and it is often used with it. However, Wegner's chair is in a whole other league from flimsy wicker.

Wegner did not name his designs, preferring only to assign them catalogue numbers. One Wegner model, the PP203, gained international exposure when a television network purchase a dozen of them, and they were subsequently seen in the Kennedy-Nixon 1960 election debates. They chose the design because of its clean lines, and simple design, but the chairs are also quite comfortable.

For your own unique version of this article please visit http://www.contentspooling.net/public.php?id=164&a=2751

Hans J. Wegner was a famous Danish furniture (mobler) designer who grew to be the most famous and successful member of the Danish Modern school of design. He is most famous for his wegner ch25, or Chair 25, a simple, elegant and stable chair in which the back legs are angled and the load bearing front legs are straight. Interestingly enough, Hans Wegner did not give his designs names, only numbers. His designs were so popular that a number of his chairs were even used in the Kennedy-Nixon election debates in 1960.