PH Chair, chrome, hallingdal black 190

About the Item

In creating the PH Chair, Poul Henningsen sought to reinvent a number of classic furniture designs that had traditionally been constructed of wood, such as the frequently encountered ‘bistro’ chair. Poul Henningsen saw an opportunity to create a next-generation product that improved upon traditional designs by the way steel was used that could allow him to create a strong and durable design that maintains a refined appearance. The PH Chair is designed in 1932, yet is timeless with its contemporary look, dynamics of shape and modern expression. It is a perfect example of Poul Henningsen’s spirit: uncomplicated simplicity. With only two bent steel tubes resting on each other at the back, this chair is aesthetically minimal but extremely functional. The PH Chair sends a clear message of elegance and functional style It is a chair for keeping focus and for having attention on the subject, whether it is to dine, to talk, to meet and discuss. The PH Chair suits many applications in many environments: at home, at work or in a public space. The PH Chair is available in chromed steel tubes and with the elegant upholstery of the seat in aniline leather in five colours (walnut, mocca, black, Indian red or un-dyed) or the exclusive Hallingdal fabric in two colors, black or grey.

Creator:

Poul Henningsen (Designer)

Dimensions:

Height: 27.17 in (69 cm)Width: 20.67 in (52.5 cm)Depth: 17.72 in (45 cm)

Style:

Bauhaus (Of the Period)

Materials and Techniques:

Chrome,Fabric

Place of Origin:

Denmark

Period:

2010-

Date of Manufacture:

2023

Production Type:

New & Custom(Current Production)

Estimated Production Time:

8-9 weeks

Condition:

Seller Location:

Copenhagen, DK

Reference Number:

Seller: PH103 1 601 00001stDibs: LU5455221498332

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Poul Henningsen

The name Poul Henningsen is synonymous with the best and most innovative modern Scandinavian lamps and other lighting. The Danish designer created a signature vocabulary of fixtures with tiered and layered shades in sculptural arrangements that are at once naturalistic and geometric.

Henningsen grew up in a town on the outskirts of Copenhagen and studied architecture at the Technical University of Denmark. He would become a noted art critic, journalist and screenwriter, but his first love was lighting design.

Henningsen’s childhood home was illuminated by oil lamps. When his family switched to electrified lighting, he was alarmed and repelled by the harsh glare cast by an incandescent bulb, and in his late teens he began conducting quasi-scientific experiments to measure which materials and methods best diffused or reflected light to give it a warm brightness. His work came to the attention of the lighting-fixtures firm Louis Poulsen, which sponsored the development of a prototype lamp. The design won a gold medal at the 1925 Paris Expositions Internationales des Arts Decóratifs et Industriels Modernes — from which the term Art Deco derives. The lamp, whose three-part shade is said to be inspired by the arrangement of a dinner plate atop a soup bowl atop a teacup, became the basis for Henningsen’s most successful design, the PH 4/3 desk lamp.

All told, Henningsen would design some 100 lighting fixtures in his career. Some of his most notable creations are hanging lamps, which include the Septima (1929), a pendant composed of seven graduated frosted-glass layers; the Spiral (1942), made of a single ribbon of enameled aluminum; and the Artichoke lamp (1958), whose 70 glass or metal fins in a staggered and graduated arrangement on a central steel frame resemble those of its namesake. The last is likely Henningsen’s masterwork and an icon of mid-20th-century design. Like all Henningsen lighting designs, it is striking, sculptural and — thanks to his insistence on the primacy of the quality of the light cast — superbly functional.

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