December 4, 2013
Happy Anniversary to Iconic Design This Year And Next
Great designs, designers, and institutions mark important milestones this year and next.
2013
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100th Woolworth Building, 1913 To celebrate the centennial year of Cass Gilbert’s “skyscraper,” once the tallest in the world, his great-granddaughter Helen Post Curry is offering guided tours of the building. Courtesy The Pictorial News Co., N.Y |
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80th Stool 60, 1933 Alvar Aalto tested the Stool 60 by flinging it and screaming, “We’ll make thousands of these one day!” He was being modest—Artek has sold millions of them, and is issuing special editions by leading designers. Courtesy Artek |
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75th Taliesin West, 1938 Frank Lloyd Wright purchased a piece of the Sonoran Desert in Arizona and began construction on the complex that would become his winter home, his studio, and the main campus of his architecture school. Courtesy the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation |
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65th Sling Chair, 1948 Harvey Probber once said that “the quality of aging gracefully” was “design’s fourth dimension,” a contention borne out by his classic chair. M2L is reissuing a number of the designer’s furniture pieces next year. Courtesy Harvey Probber Design Archive |
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50th Palace of Assembly, Chandigarh, 1963 Fears that bureaucrats are eroding its design legacy have made Le Corbusier’s building the focus of many local and international conservation campaigns. Photo by Nicholas Iyadurai |
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40th Ligne Roset Togo, 1973 To mark the anniversary of Michel Ducaroy’s extremely popular sofa, Ligne Roset is launching a lounge version upholstered in a new houndstooth fabric. Courtesy Ligne Roset |
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40th B&B Italia’s Headquarters, 1973 Designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, the building is a precursor to the Centre Georges Pompidou, and represents the company’s industrial business culture. Courtesy B&B Italia |
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25th Hansgrohe in America, 1988 One of the first Hansgrohe products to be introduced in the U.S., the Clubmaster 3-Jet Showerhead combined classic German engineering with American craftsmanship. Courtesy Hansgrohe |
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25th Photoshop, 1988 The software developed by brothers Thomas and John Knoll is so ubiquitous that its name is often used as a verb meaning “to edit an image on a computer.” Adobe acquired the license in 1988. Courtesy Adobe |
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25th Cappellini and Jasper Morrison, 1988 By manufacturing the all-metal Thinking Man’s Chair, Cappellini inaugurated the 25-year relationship with Jasper Morrison that produced this year’s CAP chair. Courtesy Cappellini |
2014
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250th House of Baccarat, 1764 From sumptuous chandeliers commissioned by the crowned heads of Europe to contemporary designs by the likes of Philippe Starck and Marcel Wanders, the 250-year history of the French luxury House of Baccarat is documented in a luscious publication released last October by Rizzoli. Courtesy Baccarat |
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125th Bernhardt Furniture, 1889 To mark the anniversary of its founding, Bernhardt Design will launch three chairs next year, developed by noted designers Ross Lovegrove, Noé Duchaufour-Lawrance, and Jephson Robb. Courtesy Bernhardt Design |
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100th Paul Rand and Hans Wegner, 1914 Born four months apart, design giants Wegner (left) and Rand left distinctively national stamps on their fields. Wegner’s sensual-but-spare forms became the gold standard for Danish Modern, while Rand put a witty American spin on graphic design, creating identities for corporations like IBM and UPS. Courtesy PP Møbler |
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80th Boffi, 1934 In 1934, Piero Boffi left his job at an aircraft manufacturer to start a more homey venture—a craftsman-led company that produced items for kitchens and bathrooms that is now a design leader in the field. Courtesy Boffi |
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75th New York World’s Fair, 1939 For the first time, a world’s fair set its eyes firmly on the future. From robots to public transit, the legacy of this exposition in New York is still felt today. Corbis Images |
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65th Rudder Table, 1949 The Herman Miller Collection is reissuing this 1949 design by Isamu Noguchi, which has a wooden top identical in shape to his more famous glass table from 1947. Courtesy Herman Miller |
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50th Ford Mustang, 1964 Ford’s most successful launch since the Model A, this quintessentially American automobile made its first appearance at the 1964 World’s Fair and has been a cultural icon ever since. Courtesy Ford |
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50th New York World’s Fair, 1964 Eero Saarinen and Charles Eames designed IBM’s pavilion with screens showing a film by the Eameses, and the exhibition Mathematica: A World of Numbers … and Beyond. Courtesy Eames Office/ Eames Foundation |
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10th 30 St. Mary Axe, 2004 Known to locals as the Gherkin or the Swiss Re building (after its main occupant), this skyscraper by Foster+Partners was a marvel of efficiency and fine engineering, using about half the energy consumed by comparably sized buildings. Courtesy Foster + Partners |
