Marshall Studios On Sale

Find many varieties of an authentic marshall studios on sale available at 1stDibs. Frequently made of ceramic, wood and walnut, every marshall studios on sale was constructed with great care. Whether you’re looking for an older or newer marshall studios on sale, there are earlier versions available from the 20th Century and newer variations made as recently as the 20th Century. When you’re browsing for the right marshall studios on sale, those designed in Mid-Century Modern styles are of considerable interest.

The average selling price for a marshall studios on sale at 1stDibs is $1,150, while they’re typically $420 on the low end and $2,500 for the highest priced.

Established in Indiana, Marshall Studios produced an eclectic array of home furnishings, textiles and even technology. In the early years, the company’s main emphasis, however, remained on lighting fixtures — primarily handcrafted, eye-catching table lamps.

Jessie Talbott Marshall set up Marshall Studios in Indianapolis, in 1922, producing hand-painted parchment lampshades. Her son Nicholas joined the company a few years later, and began production of hand-turned wooden lamp bases. After Marshall's passing in 1932, Nicholas took over company operations. At the start of the Second World War, the company moved to Veedersburg, Indiana. Though the Marshall Studios continued to produce lamps and shades, the company also created a film densitometer, selling several units under a military contract.

In 1951, Nicholas's daughter Jane Marshall Martz and her husband Gordon Martz moved to Veedersburg and joined the company. Gordon and Jane, both graduates of New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University, reshaped the face of Marshall Studios. Their vintage mid-century modern designs for table lamps, floor lamps, chandeliers and pendants became immediately popular with new homeowners of the era. Under the couple’s leadership, the company enjoyed its greatest success. The Marshall Studios M101 lamp was featured in the Museum of Modern Art’s “Good Design” exhibit in 1953, which also featured the work of other mid-century luminaries such as Jens Risom, Paul McCobb, George Nelson and more. 

For approximately the next 40 years, Marshall Studios created hundreds of unique lamp bases, lamp shades and many other decorative objects. In 1989, Jane and Gordon sold their stake in the company and retired to Fayetteville, Arkansas. 

Find vintage Marshall Studio lighting, tables and decorative objects on 1stDibs.

Organically shaped, clean-lined and elegantly simple are three terms that well describe vintage mid-century modern furniture. The style, which emerged primarily in the years following World War II, is characterized by pieces that were conceived and made in an energetic, optimistic spirit by creators who believed that good design was an essential part of good living.

ORIGINS OF MID-CENTURY MODERN FURNITURE DESIGN

• Emerged during the mid-20th century 
• Informed by European modernism, Bauhaus, International style, Scandinavian modernism and Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture
• A heyday of innovation in postwar America 
• Experimentation with new ideas, new materials and new forms flourished in Scandinavia, Italy, the former Czechoslovakia and elsewhere in Europe

CHARACTERISTICS OF MID-CENTURY MODERN FURNITURE DESIGN

• Simplicity, organic forms, clean lines  
• A blend of neutral and bold Pop art colors 
• Use of natural and man-made materials — alluring woods such as teak, rosewood and oak; steel, fiberglass and molded plywood 
• Light-filled spaces with colorful upholstery 
• Glass walls and an emphasis on the outdoors 
• Promotion of functionality

MID-CENTURY MODERN FURNITURE DESIGNERS TO KNOW

• Charles and Ray Eames
• Eero Saarinen
• Milo Baughman
• Florence Knoll
• Harry Bertoia 
• Isamu Noguchi 
• George Nelson 
• Danish modernists Hans Wegner and Arne Jacobsen, whose emphasis on natural materials and craftsmanship influenced American designers and vice versa

ICONIC MID-CENTURY MODERN FURNITURE DESIGNS

• Eames lounge chair
• Nelson daybed
• Florence Knoll sofa
• Egg chair
• Womb chair
• Noguchi coffee table
• Barcelona chair

VINTAGE MID-CENTURY MODERN FURNITURE ON 1STDIBS

The mid-century modern era saw leagues of postwar American architects and designers animated by new ideas and new technology. The lean, functionalist International-style architecture of Le Corbusier and Bauhaus eminences Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Walter Gropius had been promoted in the United States during the 1930s by Philip Johnson and others. New building techniques, such as “post-and-beam” construction, allowed the International-style schemes to be realized on a small scale in open-plan houses with long walls of glass.

Materials developed for wartime use became available for domestic goods and were incorporated into mid-century modern furniture designs. Charles and Ray Eames and Eero Saarinen, who had experimented extensively with molded plywood, eagerly embraced fiberglass for pieces such as the La Chaise and the Womb chair, respectively. 

Architect, writer and designer George Nelson created with his team shades for the Bubble lamp using a new translucent polymer skin and, as design director at Herman Miller, recruited the Eameses, Alexander Girard and others for projects at the legendary Michigan furniture manufacturer. 

Harry Bertoia and Isamu Noguchi devised chairs and tables built of wire mesh and wire struts. Materials were repurposed too: The Danish-born designer Jens Risom created a line of chairs using surplus parachute straps for webbed seats and backrests.

The Risom lounge chair was among the first pieces of furniture commissioned and produced by legendary manufacturer Knoll, a chief influencer in the rise of modern design in the United States, thanks to the work of Florence Knoll, the pioneering architect and designer who made the firm a leader in its field. The seating that Knoll created for office spaces — as well as pieces designed by Florence initially for commercial clients — soon became desirable for the home.

As the demand for casual, uncluttered furnishings grew, more mid-century furniture designers caught the spirit.

Classically oriented creators such as Edward Wormley, house designer for Dunbar Inc., offered such pieces as the sinuous Listen to Me chaise; the British expatriate T.H. Robsjohn-Gibbings switched gears, creating items such as the tiered, biomorphic Mesa table. There were Young Turks such as Paul McCobb, who designed holistic groups of sleek, blond wood furniture, and Milo Baughman, who espoused a West Coast aesthetic in minimalist teak dining tables and lushly upholstered chairs and sofas with angular steel frames.

As the collection of vintage mid-century modern chairs, dressers, coffee tables and other furniture for the living room, dining room, bedroom and elsewhere on 1stDibs demonstrates, this period saw one of the most delightful and dramatic flowerings of creativity in design history.