The best-known designers have created furniture and décor that have stood the test of time and style: comfortable, elegant, and imaginative works that enhance our homes and spirits. From Arne Jacobsen's enveloping Egg Chair to the whimsy of Fornasetti's bureaus, the minds behind these interior innovations have made a mark on the future of design.
Here are the ten most searched designers on Barnebys:
10. Paavo Tynell
Paavo Tynell's lamps have illuminated spaces all over the world, from the United Nations in New York to the Parliament House in Finland. The Scandinavian lighting master designed slim lamps that were both lightweight and decorative, emblematic of Mid-Century Modern. His iconic Snowflake chandelier, a wiry confection of snowflakes culminating in 16 handblown lampshades sold for $437,000 at auction in 2018.
9. Le Corbusier
A man of many talents—he painted abstract paintings, designed cities and buildings, and created iconic furniture—Le Corbusier was a true modernist. His furniture designs rebelled against the fine Art Deco pieces exhibited in Paris in 1925 and promoted the simplified, mass-produced furniture that defined the rest of the 20th century. He collaborated with architects Charlotte Perriand and Pierre Jeanneret to create pared-down comfortable chairs and sofas that he called human-limb objects.
8. Finn Juhl
Credited with bringing Danish Modern to the US, Finn Juhl promoted subtly sculptural chairs, shelves, sideboards and tables made from organic materials. His most famous design is the Chieftain Chair of 1949 which incorporated fine materials with a proportional, rounded design. One of the original Chieftain Chairs from 1949 sold at Phillips for nearly $655,000 in 2013.
7. Ray and Charles Eames
The husband-and-wife duo eschewed the idea that design should be relegated to the upper classes. They were proponents of mass production, while using high quality materials and innovative designs. Drawing inspiration from sources as unexpected as a potato crisp or a baseball mitt, the Eames chairs and armchairs sought to mould to the shape of the human body. The couple constructed their furniture out of plywood, aluminium, steel wire, plastic, and other materials used in aeronautics to provide more comfort, flexibility, and suppleness.
6. Piero Fornasetti
The Italian creative elevated furniture and design to theatrical props on a stage. His flair for the beautiful and romantic translated into his dining suites, wardrobes, screens and chest of drawers. His eye for art and graphics, and love for the Renaissance and antiquity, are prominently displayed in his works, which were somewhat neglected in the '70s as interest in the modern soared. Posthumously, Fornasetti's fanciful designs, which he often collaborated with Gio Ponti on, have revived in popularity.
5. Arne Jacobsen
During his 50-year career, Arne Jacobsen pioneered minimalist Danish design through his buildings and iconic furniture, including the Ant and Egg chairs. His modern design language combined both aesthetic ideals with functional attributes and made him one of the most respected designers both in his time and today.
4. Gio Ponti
One cannot think of Italian modernism without Gio Ponti. As an architect, designer, painter, teacher, journalist, and publisher, Ponti experienced the zenith of his success in the 1950s. Besides his famous architectural feats spanning Europe, his Superleggera chair designed for Cassina in 1955 is now his most recognizable and enduring design. Drawing inspiration from the traditional furniture of the fishermen in Ponti’s childhood village of Chiavari, the chair gained fame for weighing a mere 3.7 pounds. According to popular stories, the designer apparently threw one out of a fourth-floor window to convince skeptics of the chair’s resilience.
3. Hans Wegner
Hans Wegner's designs shot to fame after JFK and Richard Nixon sat in his "The Chair" during their 1959 presidential debate, launching him as a leader of Danish design that would sweep America. With a background in woodworking, Wegner sought organic materials and championed a comfortable simplicity and roundness in his designs. His original armchairs continue to fetch six figure prices at auction.
2. Alvar Aalto
Alvar Aalto's houses, buildings and designs are reflective of the natural world he saw around him in Finland: undulating shapes, rich woods, and a pervasive subtlety. His lamps, stools, and chairs convey a fluidity and subdued beauty that he mirrored in his top architectural feats: Villa Mairea, a private residence in Finland, and the Paimio sanatorium in Turku, which fused landscape and construction.
1. Josef Frank
No other designer has revolutionized Swedish modern design quite like Josef Frank. He introduced a style of furniture that was lightweight, floral, and elegant in its simplicity and combined different types of wood with natural materials, such as bamboo or stone. Today his bureaus go for sky-high prices at auction and add a touch of natural whimsy to any space.
