Hans Wegner
This school of thought arose primarily in Scandinavian countries with contributions by Poul Henningsen, Alvar Aalto, and Arne Jacobsen.
[10][11] At an early age, Wegner showed interest in craft and could draw and create paper cuttings before he learned to walk.
[12] At home, Wegner was drawn to woodcarving and created wood sculptures based on Royal Copenhagen figurines he saw at the Tønder Museum.
[14] Finishing his apprenticeship at 17, he crafted a lady's desk as part of his journeyman's test and remained employed in the workshop before joining the army.
[12][15] The exhibits were a laboratory for experimentation between Master Cabinetmakers (such as Johannes Hansen, L. Pontoppidan, Niels Vodder, Jacob Kjær, and A. J. Iversen) and the best architects of the time (such as Kaare Klint, Vilhelm Lauritzen, and Ole Wanscher).
Arne Jacobsen and Erik Møller had won a bid to design the Aarhus City Hall and employed Wegner to create the furniture.
[19] However, World War II caused delays in the City Hall project and he was first assigned to work on the Nyborg Public Library [da] under Møller and Flemming Lassen.
While the library was well-received and Møller and Lassen were awarded the Eckersberg Medal,[21] Wegner's contributions weren't as widely publicized at the time.
[24] After finishing the Aarhus City Hall project, Wegner was unable to return to Copenhagen due to travel restrictions during Nazi occupation.
Wegner was looking for a christening gift for Børge Mogensen's son, Peter, but he was unable to find one because resources were limited under Nazi occupation.
[27] For Johannes Hansen's booth in the 1944 Cabinetmakers' Guild exhibition, Wegner created what might be considered his most decorative and most laborious piece: the Fish Cabinet.
Wegner returned to Copenhagen in 1946 where he accepted a teaching position at the Danish School of Arts and Crafts at Mølgaard-Nielsen's suggestion.
[24] Wegner also worked for Palle Suenson's studio while teaching, where he was primarily responsible for renovating and designing furniture for the M/S Venus, a ship which had been damaged by the Germans during the occupation.
[40] In 1951, Ejvind Kold Kristensen created Salesco A/S, a company that exclusively promoted Wegner's work both domestically and abroad.
The prize money allowed Wegner and his wife to take a three-month study tour to the United States and Mexico.
[43] Ten years after its initial release, the Round Chair became the subject to even greater attention and more accolades when chosen for the seating of the first televised U.S. presidential debate between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy on September 26, 1960.
Georg Jensen added a hefty premium on all of Wegner's furniture which frustrated interior designers who balked at paying 3-4 times the retail prices in Denmark.
The Newer trends like bean bags, Eero Aarnio's Ball Chair from Finland, and the Memphis Group's colorful furniture from Italy were now seen as more appealing.
Getama and Wegner saw continued success in their residence halls furniture series designed for Denmark's growing university population.
[64] In August 1995, Museum Sønderjylland opened a permanent exhibit of Wegner's work in the Tønder water tower [da].
[19] PP Møbler and Marianne Wegner worked together to create an engraved oak headstone for his gravesite at Mariebjerg Cemetery in Gentofte.
Designmuseum Danmark opened the Just One Good Chair exhibition to showcase a retrospective of Wegner's work, as well as published an accompanying book in English, Danish, and German.
[75] Winners of the prize include Noritsugu Oda, Aarhus City Hall, Cabinetmakers’ Autumn Exhibition, and PP Møbler, Getama, and Carl Hansen & Søn.
Unlike his contemporaries, Wegner did not focus on materials like fiberglass and plastics (Verner Panton), steel (Poul Kjaerholm), or polyurethane foam (Arne Jacobsen).
"[7] Many of Wegner's wooden chairs are characterized by traditional joinery techniques including mortise and tenons, finger joints, and sculpted elements such as armrests and seat supports.
In the early models of the Round Chair, Wegner used a mortise and tenon joint to connect the arms at the middle of the backrest.
Unhappy with this compromise and the deceptive illusion that the arms and backrest were constructed from a single piece of wood, Wegner later updated the design to use a zigzag patterned finger joint to connect the three parts.
The back spindles are flattened in the approximate area of a person's shoulder blades, the visual result of which evokes a bird's tail plumage.
(PP Møbler) The Chair best represents Wegner's design philosophy of "continuous purification...to cut down to the simplest possible elements of four legs, a seat, and a combined top rail and armrest"[7] It rose to prominence in the 1960 televised debate between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
(PP Møbler) Wegner created this office chair inspired by Doctor Egill Snorrason's critique of how Danish furniture ignored ergonomics.
