NESSEN LAMPS 1958
Nessen Studio
Nessen Studio: NESSEN LAMPS 1958. New York: Nessen Studio, Inc., 1958. Original edition [A. I. A. File no. 31–F-23]. Oblong quarto. Glossy stapled photo illustrated wrappers. 20 pp. Black and white photographs and lighting fixture specifications. Laid in is a Typed letter signed on Nessen Studio letterhead, as well as 4 glossy product sheets folded for mailing. Faint paperclip indention to fore edge of front wrapper, otherwise a nearly fine set housed in a Nessen Studio envelope with a November 6, 1958 postage cancellation.
11.25 x 8.25 softcover Lighting catalog with 20 pages of Nessen Studio lighting fixtures, circa 1958. Housed in the original mailing envelope with the catalog are a Nessen Studio signed typed sheet of letterhead, and 4 glossy product sheets for a Wall Lamp, Umbrella Stand, Hat/Coat Rack, and a Sand Urn/Planter. All fixtures identified with dimensions and finishes.
Walter von Nessen (German American, 1899–1943) virtually pioneered the field of modern residential lighting. Before World War I, Walter von Nessen studied under Bruno Paul at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Berlin and taught at the Charlottenburg Art School. Following the war, he worked for architect Peter Behrens in Berlin and designed furniture in Stockholm from 1919 to 1923. Von Nessen immigrated to the United States in 1923 and opened Nessen Studios, with his wife Margaretta, in New York City in 1927. His practice was almost exclusively devoted to the design and fabrication of architectural lighting. He quickly created a name for himself, attracting the attention of leading architects with his sleek industrial designs. Von Nessen began to receive commissions to design lighting and other household items for top clients and was among the first wave of American industrial designers and a member of a new movement whose inner circle was to include such well-known names as Walter Dorwin Teague, Donald Deskey, Gilbert Rhode and Russell Wright.
By 1930, critics, manufacturers and museum heads were beginning to refer to him as an industrial design trailblazer and champion of modern design. Of all von Nessen designs, however, lamps were always in the forefront of new trends. A probable reason for this was expressed in a 1930 edition of Lamp Buyers Journal (the forerunner of Home Lighting and Accessories): "The latest, newest most radical expressions of art in industry seem particularly applicable to lamps because a lamp highlights a room and it may well be extreme...and it strives to be an expression of ourselves, our times and our environment."
Another pertinent comment was made by a reporter who suggested that lamps are especially interesting because they have no tradition to follow or defy. Unquestionably, it was von Nessen's concepts that led to the modern tradition in lamp design. From the outset, his designs were the foremost examples of the modern trend. The progression of von Nessen styles range from the German deco of the early 20's to the American Deco of the mid 20's to the functionalism which dominated his work until his death in 1943. By combining functionalism with new materials, he helped establish a new design vocabulary.
He had relatively little competition. With the exception of Walter Kantack, an architect who focused on the design of large-scale bronze lamps for building applications, von Nessen was the only major designer who concentrated on innovative contemporary residential lighting.
Von Nessen's work in the U.S. spanned little more than a decade, beginning with his early commissions as an industrial designer and culminating in commercially successful functional lamps for the consumer market. At some point during this whirlwind of design activity von Nessen married Greta von Nessen (Swedish, 1898 – 1975) the daughter of a Swedish architect who worked in his studio. Following his death in 1943, she revived the Nessen Studio after World War II, turning to the design of lamps that were a continuation of her husband's concepts.
A few years later, Stanley Wolf joined the studio, buying the business two years later, in 1954, determined to continue the tradition of landmark design concepts. One of the first lamps he designed for Nessen, in 1952, is a minimal design with a with a handsome brass column. The lamp, still in the line, was featured in the interior of Frank Lloyd Wright's Usonian House which was erected by the Guggenheim Museum on its Fifth Avenue property in 1953, before construction of the museum's current building.
In early 1960, Nessen introduced a collection of table lamps designed by Elizabeth Kauffer, featuring bases of the finest Italian marbles - probably the first use of this material for contemporary lamps. Kauffer, originally associated with Gilbert Rhode, later became color coordinator for the Herman Miller Furniture Company.
In the late 1960s, a leisure lighting series was designed by George Nelson & Company, a leading post-war industrial design firm also associated with Herman Miller. Most distinctive of the group is a hanging beehive with a hexagonal pyramid hood; the luminous elements are translucent white acrylic cylinders in a honeycomb pattern. Principally designed for outdoors, the lamp later involved into an indoor version. [Nessen Lighting, the Cooper Hewitt, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Wikipedia]