Kimiko Yoshida
Early 2000s French Modern Photography
Aluminum
Early 2000s French Post-Modern Photography
Aluminum
Vintage 1980s Italian Modern Vases
Murano Glass
Early 2000s Italian Modern Vases
Murano Glass
Early 2000s Italian Modern Vases
Murano Glass
People Also Browsed
2010s Italian Modern Glass
Murano Glass
Vintage 1980s Italian Mid-Century Modern Vases
Murano Glass
Late 20th Century French Brutalist Sculptures
Steel
21st Century and Contemporary Italian Organic Modern Vases
Blown Glass
Antique 19th Century Japanese Chinese Export Prints
Paper
Vintage 1960s American Mid-Century Modern Bedroom Sets
Walnut
Vintage 1970s Italian Mid-Century Modern Figurative Sculptures
Glass
Vintage 1960s Italian Mid-Century Modern Table Lamps
Brass
Vintage 1980s Italian Mid-Century Modern Vases
Murano Glass
Mid-20th Century Italian Mid-Century Modern Glass
Blown Glass
Vintage 1960s Italian Mid-Century Modern Paperweights
Art Glass
Vintage 1970s Ceramics
Ceramic
Mid-20th Century Italian Mid-Century Modern Vases
Art Glass
Vintage 1980s Italian Mid-Century Modern Vases
Murano Glass
Vintage 1970s Israeli Modern Prints
Other
Vintage 1950s American Mid-Century Modern Photography
Paper
Recent Sales
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Glass
Murano Glass
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Glass
Murano Glass
Early 2000s Italian Modern Vases
Murano Glass
A Close Look at Modern Furniture
The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw sweeping social change and major scientific advances — both of which contributed to a new aesthetic: modernism. Rejecting the rigidity of Victorian artistic conventions, modernists sought a new means of expression. References to the natural world and ornate classical embellishments gave way to the sleek simplicity of the Machine Age. Architect Philip Johnson characterized the hallmarks of modernism as “machine-like simplicity, smoothness or surface [and] avoidance of ornament.”
Early practitioners of modernist design include the De Stijl (“The Style”) group, founded in the Netherlands in 1917, and the Bauhaus School, founded two years later in Germany.
Followers of both groups produced sleek, spare designs — many of which became icons of daily life in the 20th century. The modernists rejected both natural and historical references and relied primarily on industrial materials such as metal, glass, plywood, and, later, plastics. While Bauhaus principals Marcel Breuer and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe created furniture from mass-produced, chrome-plated steel, American visionaries like Charles and Ray Eames worked in materials as novel as molded plywood and fiberglass. Today, Breuer’s Wassily chair, Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona chair — crafted with his romantic partner, designer Lilly Reich — and the Eames lounge chair are emblems of progressive design and vintage originals are prized cornerstones of collections.
It’s difficult to overstate the influence that modernism continues to wield over designers and architects — and equally difficult to overstate how revolutionary it was when it first appeared a century ago. But because modernist furniture designs are so simple, they can blend in seamlessly with just about any type of décor. Don’t overlook them.