In 1976, the Ergon chair was introduced by Bill Stumpf, a designer for Herman Miller. It had a foam-filled back and seat, gas-lift levers to change the height and tilt. The Ergon was based on the new science of ergonomics, first used to design aeroplane cockpits.Read More →
George Nelson (1907 – 1986) was an American industrial designer. His Storagewall shelf system, which he made in 1945, changed the way offices worked. The Marshmallow sofa from the 1950s is one of his best-known pieces.Read More →
Walter Landor (1913 – 1995) was a leading expert in corporate identity and brand design. His clients included Coca-Cola, Fuji Films, Philip Morris, and the World Wildlife Fund. The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History has dedicated a collection to him.Read More →
Frederick John Kiesler, an Austrian-American architect, theoretician, theatre designer, artist, and sculptor, was born Friedrich Jacob Kiesler in Czernowitz, Austria-Hungary Empire (now Chernivtsi, Ukraine), in 1890. 1965 saw his passing.Read More →
Tammis Keefe (1913–1960) was an American textile designer. She designed everything from dish towels to glassware in her airy Dorothy Leibis Studio. Her work can be found at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cooper Hewitt and the Fashion Institute of Technology.Read More →
Philco was founded in Philadelphia in 1892. In 1929, using assembly-line techniques, the firm produced the first truly low-priced radios. The firm became a leading manufacturer of audio products, adding domestic stoves, refrigerators, air conditioners, and other appliances to its line. In the 1950s, it produced a series of television set housings in historicist cabinets with technologically advanced features and large screens.Read More →
Marc Harrison (1936-1998) was an industrial designer from the United States. Harrison sustained a significant brain injury in a sledding accident when he was eleven years old. He had to relearn simple functions like walking and talking as a result of the crash. Harrison gained experience and motivation for his future work as an industrial designer due to this incident and his lengthy recovery.Read More →
In 1935 he founded his own design company. He designed everything from toys, boats, aircraft, kitchen appliances, lamps and lampshades, beer cans, plastic containers, cigarette lighters, jukeboxes, watches and baby carriages.Read More →
Her family settled in the USA when she was in her teens and took the Carnegie name. In 1909, with a friend, she opened a tiny dress and hat shop, New York, known as Carnegie—Ladies’ Hatter.Read More →
In 1934, he worked in the Indian office of American architect Antonin Raymond. In 1937, in the Tokyo office, he studied Japanese carpentry techniques. In 1941, he set up his first workshop in Seattle. In 1942 in Idaho, Nakashima studied with an old Japanese carpenter until Antonin Raymond arranged his release. Read More →
Elbert Green Hubbard (1856 – 1915) was an American furniture designer. Hubbard met William Morris in 1894 and the following year inspired by Morris’s Kelmscott Press, founded the Raycroft Press’ East Aurora, near Buffalo, New York. He was the founder of the Roycrofters, an Arts and Crafts community; he organized workshops, lectured, and wrote as a highly effective champion of the Arts and Crafts philosophy.Read More →
Nuovo studied product and automotive design and graphics and communications design at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.Read More →
The Faience Manufacturing Company was an American manufacturing company that operated between 1880 – 1892 in the Greenpoint area of Brooklyn, New York. There is little evidence of the remains of the Company as it failed in 1892.Read More →
In 1928, Oreste Pennino registered a series of 12 trademarks used from 1926 and illustrating signs of the Zodiac. The firm produced bracelets, rings, clips, earrings, lockets, and brooches and, from 1947, watches and watchcases. Its wares were designed in the forms of flower bouquets, fruit, leaves, and trees in rose, pale and dark blue, and violet. The firm closed in 1961.Read More →
He was hired to work in the Pontiac design lab after coming to the attention of Harley Earl at General Motors. Later, in 1938, he worked for Raymond Loewy’s design consultant on Studebaker cars, particularly the 1947 Starlight coupé. Loewy received the majority of the critical accolades. Read More →
Isamu Noguchi (1904–1988), was an American sculptor and designer. He was born in Los Angeles and professionally active in New York. He was influential and well-received in the twentieth century. He produced sculptures, gardens, furniture and lighting designs, ceramics, architecture, and set designs throughout his lifetime of creative experimentation. His work, both subtle and bold, traditional and modern, set a new standard for reintegrating the arts.Read More →
Ulrich Franzen, the German-born American architect, was a leading figure in the first post-war generation of American architects; including Paul Rudolph, Harry Cobb, John Maclane Johansen, and Philip Johnson. Read More →
Geoffrey Beene (1927 – 2004) was an American fashion designer; born Haynesville, Louisiana. He was a premed student at Tulane University when he found himself sketching gowns when he became bored during his lectures. Along with Bill Blass, he was regarded as the Godfather of American sportswear. Read More →
The 1959 Cadillac is more of a temple than an automobile, a Gothic memorial to America’s glory years. It was overly long, low, and overstyled, and it’s the 50s’ final flourish. The 59’s outlandish space-age appearance, weird fins, and lavish 390 cubic inch V8 are fascinating, but the most striking aspect of the car is its blatant arrogance.Read More →
Walter Kantack was an American Lighting Designer born in Meriden, Connecticut. He completed his studies at the Pratt Institute in New York.Read More →