The Warm and Natural Designs of Russel Wright!

We kick-started our coverage of influential industrial designers with the incomparable Raymond Loewy, whose designs have touched all facets of life--from furniture, to interiors, to cars and even aviation. We bring you today the style of Russel Wright, another important and talented industrial designer who also heavily influenced American design.

Where Loewy was known for his cutting edge, sleek and futuristic designs, Wright’s style was more earthy, accessible and organic. Taking his cues from nature, his designs often featured curved and soft forms, and his color palettes were lifted straight from natural landscapes with hues like browns, creams, light blues and greens. Wright is most well-known for his contributions to dinnerware: his American Modern dinnerware collection, made from 1939-1959 by the Steubenville Pottery company, is considered the most popular ceramic dinnerware in history.

Unlike Loewy, Wright’s furniture designs were quite popular. He was responsible for creating several top-selling furniture lines, his most popular the Art Deco blond wooden furniture line he created for Conant-Ball company. He also created home décor accessories and even textiles. A strong believer that the table was the center of the home, he did a lot of work with dinnerware and ceramics, designing lines of Melmac melamine resin plastic dinnerware for the home, like his line “Residential,” which became quite popular. His accessible and practical designs have been credited with helping mainstream American families discover the modern style. Though he often designed using solid colors, he would occasionally foray into pattern, usually borrowing designs from the plant world.

Wright had a unique outlook and connection to American history--he came from an old American family that could trace lineage to two signers of the Declaration of Independence. These ties led to a strong sense of American loyalty and an understanding of American style. Getting art training early through the Art Academy of Cincinnati, he briefly studied law at Princeton University before succumbing to his talents and moving to New York City to do set design under Norman Del Geddes. It was after the theater he worked at closed that he began to foray into props and decorative objects, eventually moving into home décor accessories. After meeting and marrying his talented wife Mary, the two created Wright Accessories, a successful home décor design business. Though Wright passed away in 1976, his daughter Annie manages the still successful and active Wright Studios, proof that Wright’s style and legacy continues even today.

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The Bold and Colorful Glass Art of Dale Chihuly!

While we’ve been bringing you some of the best past and contemporary influences in the worlds of architecture and interior, furniture and industrial design, we’re getting back to the basics and bringing you a stunning and supremely talented glass artist. Dale Chihuly’s body of work is so varied and wide-ranging it’s hard to classify, but there’s no doubt of his influence on the field of glass art, and really, art in general.

Born in Tacoma, Washington in 1941, his school background is diverse and impressive: he enrolled at the College of the Puget Sound in 1959, later transferring to the University of Washington at Seattle where he graduated in 1965 with a degree in interior design. His life changing moment came in 1964, however, when he was introduced to the art of glass. Being introduced to blowing glass, he continued with his education, receiving a Master of Science in sculpture from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He studied glass in Venice on a Fulbright Fellowship and then went on to earn a Master of Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design. Obviously not one to slow down, he helped establish a glass program at RISD and went on to start his own school, the Pilchuck Glass School.

As a teacher and an early artist, Chihuly first began to grab attention with his glass work on a number of temporary glass art pieces, as well as for his reputation for collaboration with artists of other media. He encouraged his students to approach glass from unorthodox perspectives, and this often produced important revelations in the glass world. Chihuly was very interested in glass as a form of sculpture and he focused often on that most ancient of accessories, the vessel. Through sculpture and his vessels he explores color, shape, pattern and form. Often described as not having the most complex of blowing techniques, Chihuly allowed glass to find its own shape and he used minimal tools.

He’s created numerous series throughout the year, among them “Baskets”, featuring translucent orbs in bowl-shapes, “Persians”, with lots of wavy colored lines throughout the glass, and our personal favorite, “Sea Forms”, gorgeous, jellyfish-like shapes. Chihuly is also known for his inspiring large-scale installations, like large glass “floats” in water, glass forests and flowers, and even homage to Italian glass with “Chihuly Over Venice.”

To honestly sum up all of Chihuly’s work in one article would be futile—the man’s work has been prolific, and he continues to teach and create even until today. Though car and surfing accidents have left him unable to do the work himself, Chihuly currently guides and directs a team of fellow artisans and is still leaving his imprint on the world of glass.

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The Industrial and Cool Designs of Raymond Loewy!

We focus a lot on those interior designers and furniture designers of the past whose work was so powerful and life-altering that it still impacts design today. There’s another type of design that has an equal impact on our lives, and that’s industrial design. You have to look no further than Raymond Loewy to find one of the best industrial designers of all time.

What is so striking about Loewy’s body of work is how futuristic and ahead of the time it is. Much of his career took place during the 1930s-1950s (though he is known to have worked for over seven decades); way before many of the most notable Mid-Century Modern designers started turning heads. Though stylish, Loewy took into account many elements other than just looks to create his designs, which no doubt has played a part in their popularity. His designs often feature sensuous curves, bright colors, stark contrasts and other modern elements.

Some of his most famous industrial designs are an interior of a Boeing 307 (Stratoliner) owned by Howard Hughes, steam locomotives for the Pennsylvania Railroad,a 1935 Sears Coldspot refrigerator, Electrolux L300 refrigerator, Lucky Strike package, the 1947 Studebaker Champion, Schick electric razor, Coca-Cola bottle redesign, the Shell logo, the interiors of NASA's Skylab space station, and many, many more items that made an impact.

His furniture and other home items followed the suit of his intelligent industrial design, featuring straight and curved lines, bright colors, forward thinking and great shapes. Though not as popular as other Mid-Century Modern furniture designers, his furniture designs are fun, pop-y and fresh, and would still look great in interiors of today—Mid-Century Modern style or not!

Originally from France, Loewy made his way to the United States with only his military uniform and little money to his name, but with talent, skills and perseverance became one of the most influential industrial designers this nation has ever known, impacting a whole world of products, interiors, vehicles, furniture and more!

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The Accessible and Cool Furniture of Edward Wormley!

Last week we focused nearly all of our posts on the colorful design inspirations of Verner Panton. While we thought his design ideas were amazing, we also know that not everyone is as interested in such bold, bright colors as he was. That’s why today we bring you a design influence who’s work carefully and skillfully straddles the line between 70s psychedelic color and Mid-Century Modern cool.

Edward Wormley’s work is stylish, no doubt about it, but it’s also very accessible, as it can be used in a number of different interior styles and enjoyed by homeowner’s of varied tastes. Because his work is so varied, it’s hard to pin down specific characteristics that all his pieces have in common, but you can expect to see a mixture of clean, straight lines with the occasional interesting angle. Some of his pieces feature bright colored upholstery; others more demure neutral fabrics---but all his pieces seem to both blend with their surroundings and stand out from the crowd. Not even sticking to only one type of furniture piece, you can see in the portfolio of his career a number of side and lounge chairs, sofas, credenzas, shelves, tables, desks and other wooden case goods. While no one piece really gained the sort of popularity as other Mid-Century designers of his era, as a whole his body of work is quite impressive.

Born in Illinois in 1907, Wormley was actually afflicted with childhood polio and unable to walk until he was five years old. Overcoming this temporary disability he graduated from high school and became a student at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1926 for two years. Unfortunately, he was unable to finish due to a lack of finances. He worked a few years at Marshall Field and Co and later for Berkey and Gay and eventually took a trip to Paris in 1930, where he met the influential Emile Jacques Ruhlmann. Inspired and excited Wormley returned to the US and began work at the Dunbar Furniture Corporation in Illinois, which would eventually become one of the most important steps of his career!

At first only hired to work on Dunbar’s furniture line that was the lowest priced, Wormley’s talent quickly shined through, and he began designing furniture that respected the past but looked forward to the future. His work became so popular that Dunbar itself became one of the top modern furniture companies in the country. Credited for creating almost 150 new furniture pieces for Dunbar each year, Wormley also lent his talents to rugs, lighting, and fabric and textile designs.

Eventually going on to win awards and get featured in museum exhibitions of modern furniture, Wormley’s biggest contribution is his dedication to both style and design. His work was gorgeous, but it was also comfortable to use, easy to incorporate into décor and reasonably priced compared to other designers.

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