1960s Teak and Opaline Glass "Drop" Pendants by Louis Poulsen, Denmark

Louis Poulsen is world-renowned as an innovator in modern Danish lighting, but this wasn’t the goal from the start. Founded in 1874 by Ludvig R. Poulsen as a wine importer, the business went through several incarnations before its first pendant lights came to fruition. Through its designs, the company helped establish the foundations of good lighting — function, comfort and ambience — that are now standard in modern furniture design.

In 1924, Danish architect Poul Henningsen partnered with Louis Poulsen & Co., then an electrical supply company, to create what’s now known as the Paris lamp. This design, which incorporated three layers of curved metal disks, created ambience with its indirect light instead of glare. Shown at the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris — the exhibition that brought Art Deco design to worldwide attention — the Paris lamp was awarded a gold medal. This led to Poulsen and Henningsen working together on several lighting pieces, including the popular PH pendant light with its concentric shades for the Forum Building in Copenhagen. These high-profile projects helped make Louis Poulsen a go-to purveyor of innovative lighting design.

One of the company’s most well-known lamps is Henningsen’s PH Artichoke lamp (1958), with its 72 copper leaves artfully placed to conceal the light bulb, prevent glare and promote a warm, alluring glow in any room. Another is the steel and die-cast zinc AJ lamp (1960), which Arne Jacobsen designed with an adjustable angled shade for his commission for the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen. The company has also worked with notables such as Verner Panton and Alfred Homann as well as, more recently, Louise Campbell and Oki Sato.

In 2010, the company was awarded the American Institute of Architects’ Honors in Collaborative Achievement Award; it was the first lighting manufacturer to receive this honor. In 2018, the company was acquired by an investment subsidiary of Investindustrial VI L.P. Still headquartered in Denmark, the brand continues to produce its high-end lighting for both indoor and outdoor use, manufacturing both classic icons as well as new designs. “We design to shape light,” states Louis Poulsen. In doing so, they have also shaped culture.

Find a range of new and vintage Louis Poulsen floor lamps, table lamps and other lighting and furniture on 1stDibs.

Holmegaard has been creating quality glassware for almost two centuries. The legendary glassworks has collaborated with scores of celebrated designers over its long history, including Arne Jacobsen, Louise Campbell, Bodil Kjær and many others, with each artisan crafting vases, bottles and other serveware and decorative objects that are widely loved by collectors and art connoisseurs alike. Today Holmegaard is a powerhouse of functionalist modern Danish glass design.

Holmegaard Glassworks was the dream of Danish Count Christian Danneskiold-Samsøe, who petitioned the king of Denmark for permission to build a factory. Sadly, by the time permission was granted, the count had passed away, leaving his dowager, the Countess Henriette Danneskiold-Samsøe, to carry on her late husband’s dream in 1825. The factory was established in the town of Fensmark in the Holmegaard bog, where rich peat could be harvested and used to fuel the high-temperature kilns required to produce glass there.

The factory initially produced only simple mouth-blown green glass packaging bottles — the need was for glassware that was merely functional. It wasn’t until the 1920s that it made progress as a significant entity in the world of design. There was a fruitful partnership to create dinner glassware with the Royal Danish Porcelain Factory and glass artist Oluf Jensen. This was followed in 1925 by Holmegaard’s hiring Jacob Eiler Bang as the glassworks’ first in-house designer.

Bang was trained as an architect and was working on the Danish Pavilion at the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts — the fair that brought the Art Deco style to worldwide attention — when his efforts caught the attention of Holmegaard. Bang believed in the concept of making things that were “beautiful, strong, practical and cheap.” His seductive, functionalist designs for vases, decanters, bottles and other objects — guided by the theories that underpin Scandinavian modernism — garnered acclaim for both Bang and Holmegaard, and he became known as one of the fathers of functionalism in Danish glassware.

Holmegaard went on to work with Per Lütken, who created intricate objects that redefined the factory’s style and Danish glass design as a whole. Lütken produced over 3,000 pieces for the glassworks, including the revered Provence bowl, one of the pieces for which the glassworks is best known. The brand went on to work with other notable artists including Otto Brauer and Jacob Bang’s son, Michael Bang, whose Palet range, Fontaine wine glass range, and Mandarin lamps are among Holmegaard’s most iconic creations.

Today, Holmegaard Glassworks is owned by Rosendahl Design Group. It is Denmark’s largest manufacturer of glass in addition to being the oldest and most historic.

Find vintage Holmegaard sconces, vessels, decorative bowls, tableware and other pieces on 1stDibs.