Hans Wegner

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 3/5/2011)

Hans Wegner (1914-2007) was born in Denmark and worked as a child apprentice to cabinetmaker H. F. Stahlberg. After serving in the military, he attended the Danish School of Arts and Crafts and then the Architectural Academy in Copenhagen. He held a strong belief that furniture should be functional and beautiful. He designed over 500 chairs during the course of his career, and he was responsible for making Danish design popular on an international scale.

Wegner worked for Arne Jacobsen for several years and then started his own company in 1943. Most of his chair designs were manufactured by PP Møbler and Carl Hansen & Søn. The Peacock chair, designed in 1947, was given its nickname by Finn Juhl. It has a slatted back rest that fans out to resemble a peacock tail, with flat sections of slats that look like the eyes of a peacock feather. This chair was inspired by the traditional Windsor chair. 

Wegner's breakthrough and major sales success was the Round chair (1949), which is now simply called The Chair. It rose to prominence after being featured on the cover of the American magazine Interiors, which called it "the world's most beautiful chair." The Round chair was used during the Nixon-Kennedy presidential debates, giving it mass exposure. Other well-known Wegner designs are the Shell chair (1948), the Y-Chair (1949), the Cow Horn chair (1952), the Bear chair (1954), the Bull chair (1960) and the Three-Legged chair (1963).

In 1960 Wegner came out with several variations on the Ox chair which came with or without horns and showed a playful side of his designs. "We must take care," he said, "that everything doesn't get so dreadfully serious. We must play--but we must play seriously."

From architonic.com

Peacock chair
1stdibs.com

The Chair
1stdibs.com

Three-legged Shell chair
1stdibs.com

CH24 Wishbone or Y chair
scandinavia-design.fr

Cowhorn chair
moma.org

Papa Bear chair
mid2mod.com

Bull chair
liveauctioneers.com

Ox chair
midcenturia.com

Wegner relaxing in an Ox chair
dailyicon.net

To watch a Wegner Peacock chair or The Chair being handcrafted, here are two videos that follow the process from beginning to end.

Pronunciation Guide