HJEMMETS INDRETNING
Finn Juhl
[København] Thaning & Appels Forlag, [1954]. First edition. Text in Danish. 16mo. Photo illustrated paper covered boards with cloth backstrip titled in black. 176 pp. Fully illustrated with coarse halftones and line illustrations.Fragile book with edge wear to both panels and general signs of use: a good copy only. Rare.
4.25 x 6.75 hardcover book with 176 pages fully illustrated with coarse halftones and line illustrations with text in Danish. Finn Juhl collected his views on interior design in this small book whose title translates “THE DECORATION OF THE HOME.” In practice, he experimented with the ideas in his own functional and beautiful home at Kratvænget 15 in Ordrup.
In 1950, Juhl participated in the Contemporary Danish Architecture as well as the Handcraft Guild, both exhibitions are held in London. In Denmark he begins designing private projects such as Mrs. Anthon Petersen's vacation home in Asserbo. Enjoying the support of his friend, Edgar Kaufmann Jr., director of the Department of Industrial Design at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (MoMA), Finn Juhl makes his debut in the US. In the same year, the Academic Council at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts tasks Finn Juhl with what will become his most prominent and famous design manifestation - the complete furnishing and design of the Trusteeship Council Chamber at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York.
In 1951, Finn Juhl also initiates a partnership with Baker Furniture, Inc. in Grand Rapids, Michigan. With a range of furniture including The Baker Sofa and The Cocktail Table, Finn Juhl defines the company's modern style of design. During this period Finn Juhl is increasingly inspired by the American lifestyle and his American design colleagues.
In 1952, the Trusteeship Council Chamber is inaugurated and the world opens its eyes to Finn Juhl. He participates in the Angewandte Kunst aus Dänemark exhibition in Zürich, Switzerland, re-designs Georg Jensen's Fifth Avenue store in New York and designs a room with his furniture at the National Museum of Decorative Arts and Design in Trondheim, Norway. The room is still part of the permanent exhibition at the museum. In 1953, Finn Juhl's career takes off and due to his new international network he increasingly begins to draw on inspiration from abroad. He spends more and more of his time working abroad and partaking in international exhibitions, mainly in the US. Edgar Kaufmann Jr. introduces Finn Juhl to influential people from the cultural scene, among them Charles Eames and George Nelson. With these accomplishments Thaning & Appels requested Juhl author a volume on Home Decoration for their “How To” series.
Contents include these sections [translated]:
- Housing types
- New Danish furniture types
- Housing assembly
- New trends
- A current housing assembly
- Bedroom and chambers
- The room and the furniture
- A small museum interior
Finn Juhl [Denmark, 1912 – 1989] wanted to become an art historian. However, his father wouldn't allow a career in the arts. Instead, Finn Juhl enrolled at the Department of Architecture at the Royal Academy of Arts in Copenhagen. While he was still a student, Finn Juhl started working with the prominent Danish architect Vilhelm Lauritzen in 1934. At his studio, he worked on major projects such as the Danish Broadcasting House and Copenhagen Airport. Finn Juhl was kept so busy, that he never finished his studies. Despite this, he received the honor of becoming a member of the Academic Architect Society in 1942, and later in life, he became a visiting professor at the Institute of Design in Chicago. At the time when he had made himself a name as a furniture designer, he would always speak of himself as being self-taught.
Like other modernist pioneers, Finn Juhl started from scratch without role models or inherited restrictions. He designed by measuring his own body and analyzing how the individual components of the chair should carry the human body. The potential strength of the material was utilized to the maximum just like in nature’s own constructions.
Rather than thinking in terms of practical construction, Finn Juhl had the mind-set of a sculptor, when he shaped a piece of furniture. His ambition was to design furniture with movement and life. Finn Juhl took pride in making both the structurally supportive elements of the furniture and the seated person look as though they are floating. In some of his chairs, the backrest and the seat are almost invisibly joined, as if they were clouds floating through the room.
During his first years at the Cabinetmakers’ Guild Exhibition Finn Juhl primarily worked with fully upholstered furniture. The upholstered furniture allowed Finn Juhl to focus entirely on the sculptural, organic shapes of his furniture, which became his trademark. With fully upholstered furniture he would ‘only’ have to focus on the exterior shape and let master joiner Niels Vodder work on the wooden skeleton.
A few years after Finn Juhl’s debut at the Cabinetmaker’s Guild Exhibition he became increasingly interested in applying wood as the dominant shaping material, rather than ‘hiding’ it under a cover of upholstery. When he designed the 45 Chair it had become his objective to create a chair that was almost self-explanatory in its construction. This way, he became one of the first to clearly disconnect the upholstered areas from the wooden frame.