The Designs that Forged an Icon: 100 Years of Braun

Sometimes a brand comes along with an outlook so refreshingly new that it revolutionizes an art. While for some that means bringing extra qualities to the table, for Braun, it meant taking things away. Radical simplicity. Under the motto, “Less but better,” Braun set about altering the face of modern product design with a steadfast set of values that revolved around efficiency.

Hermann Gretsch (1895 – 1950) designer for Arzberg

Hermann Gretsch was a German architect, engineer and product designer. In the 1930s, Gretsch worked for the Porzellanfabrik Arzberg.Read More →
Herbert Bayer (1900 – 1985) – Universal Typeface – Bauhaus Master

The universal typeface, 1925, was a geometric alphabet based on bar and circle and was designed by Herbert Bayer (1900) to function efficiently in a technological society. Bayer rejected the “archaic and complicated gothic alphabet” which lingered in the most scientifically advanced society of its time, Germany of the first world war period and the postwar era. Read More →
Hugo Leven (1874 – 1956) German Sculptor and Metalsmith

Leven studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule and then at the Düsseldorf Art Academy. He worked in his father Louis Leven’s studio for a time, had numerous contacts with French artists who had a strong influence on him, and quickly became known. Engelbert Kayser hired him as the first employee in his studio. From 1895 to 1904, Leven designed numerous models for Kayserzinn; his works had a lasting influence on the Art Nouveau pewter foundry. He also worked for the Kreuter company in Hanau and other companies that manufactured metal, silver and earthenware, such as B. Koch & Bergfeld and WMF.Read More →
WMF – Württembergische Metallwarenfabrik (1853)

The outbreak of the Second World War created significant difficulties during the early stages of restoration, leading to the closure of the NKA (Contemporary Products Department), but by the early 1950s, the company was back on track. Many of Wilhelm Wagenfeld’s WMF creations date from these years. Read More →
Michael Boehm (b.1944) German Glassware and Ceramics Designer

Boehm joined Rosenthal in 1966. His limited-edition Reticelli range illustrated his interest in Italian glass by incorporating cotton twist threads in the molten glass-like 17th-century Venetian vessels. Read More →
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886 – 1969) German architect and designer

Between 1905 and 1907, he worked as an apprentice to architect and furniture designer Bruno Paul in Berlin, where he studied wooden furniture design. He created furniture for all of his early homes, including the Werner residence.Read More →
Carl Hugo Pott (1906 – 1985) – German Metalworker & Silversmith

Carl Pott studied design and metallurgy at technical school in Solingen and Forschungsinitut unf Profieramt für Edelmetalle, Schwäbisch-Gmünd.Read More →
The brains and Braun of designer Dieter Rams

The way Dieter Rams tell it good design boils down to something as simple durability. Okay, not durability alone. A Well-designed piece is so self-explanatory that figuring out how to use it as simple as looking at it. And a design develops from the inside out because it involves not only aesthetics but also function.Read More →
Josef Albers (1888 – 1976) – German painter, designer, theoretician, and teacher

Josef Albers believed Art, he felt, is seeing, and he believed that his contemporaries had not done a good job of this.Read More →
The Designs that Forged an Icon: 100 Years of Braun

Braun’s archive can be seen as a sort of manifesto for meticulous design: from screw-shape to ergonomic button placement, nothing is forgotten. Reduced to their logical conclusion, Braun products are unmatched in their timelessness, the only sign of their age being the electronics within.Read More →
Alfons Bach (1904 – 1999) German Industrial Designer

In New York City, Bach planned the remodelling of Sach’s and the Seneca Textile Building. His work was shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in early contemporary industrial art shows. In Stamford, Connecticut, he created his own home in 1938. He oversaw the construction of the Ridgeway Center, one of the country’s earliest shopping malls. In the 1930s, Bach designed tubular steel furniture for the Lloyd Manufacturing Company. Until 1947, they continued to produce his works. These tubular objects are seen to constitute a link between Bauhaus and contemporary design. In 1959, he relocated to Florida. In Delray Beach, he designed the Palm Trail Plaza and the Palm Trail Yacht Club. In 1969, he was the curator of the United States display at the International Industrial Design Exhibition. He created designs for GE, Keystone Silver, Pacific Mills, and Bigelow-Samford. He was the American Designers Institute’s president.Read More →
Rasch Brothers German Wallpaper Manufacturer

After WWII, the company maintained its progressive edge with the sale of beautiful wallpapers by designers such as Lucienne Day, Salvador Dal, Shinkichi Tajiri, and Bruno Munari. The firm released their Zeitwande (Timewalls) wallpaper line in 1992, which featured designs by Ron Arad, Ettore Sottsass, Alessandro Mendini, Borek Spek, and Matteo Thun.Read More →
Marianne Brandt (1893–1983) German painter designer and metalworker

The modernist German designer Marianne Brandt was one of the few women associated with the Bauhaus to make her reputation outside the traditional arts and crafts sectors related to women such as textiles, weaving and pottery. Read More →
Konstantin Grcic Unveils – CUP Chair For Plank | 🇩🇪 German Design

For travellers, the benefits of plastic shell suitcases have come to be appreciated. They are extremely light and flexible, yet powerful and good looking. Suitcases made of thin vacuum-formed plastic sheets have completely transformed the product category. As a designer of the furniture, Konstantin Grcic was surprised by this ingenuity and the suitability of the modern chair covers for production and performance. Read More →
Peter Raacke (b.1928) German metalworker and designer

Hessische Metallwerke commissioned Raacke to produce metal cutlery, kitchen equipment, and cookware, most notably his “Mono-a” line (v-33), with silverware available in stainless steel and sterling silver.Read More →
Bruno Paul (1874 – 1968) German architect, cabinetmaker, designer, and teacher

Bruno Paul (1874 – 1968) was a German architect, cabinetmaker, designer, and teacher. He was born in Seifhennersdorf. He studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule, Dresden, from 1886 and painting at the Akademie fur Kunst, Munich, under Paul Hocker and Wilhelm von Diez, from 1894. Read More →
Tea and coffee set by Marguerite Friedlander

She designed the Hallesche Form tea and coffee set for KPM in 1930, which was a huge commercial success, especially with Trude Petri’s gold rings (1931) decor.Read More →
Anchor Blocks – 19th Century construction toy

Anchor Blocks were a German system of building blocks that were popular as a children’s construction toy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, notably in Europe. Dr F. Ad. Richter in Rudolstadt, Germany, began developing and manufacturing the system in 1879. The concept was based on the FROEBEL block system, which significantly impacted Frank Lloyd WRIGHT’s design philosophy.Read More →
Jugendstil an artistic style

Jugendstil, an artistic style that originated around the mid-1890s in Germany and persisted throughout the first decade of the 20th century. READ MORRead More →
Anni Albers (1899 – 1994) German Textile Designer, artist and teacher

Anni Albers was a German Textile Designer, artist and teacher. She was born in Berlin and was the Wife of Josef Albers.Read More →