Rattan Clad Lidded Box by Carl Auböck
View Similar Items
Rattan Clad Lidded Box by Carl Auböck
About the Item
- Creator:Werkstätte Carl Auböck (Designer)
- Dimensions:Height: 3.75 in (9.53 cm)Diameter: 3.37 in (8.56 cm)
- Style:Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)
- Materials and Techniques:
- Place of Origin:
- Period:
- Date of Manufacture:1950s
- Condition:
- Seller Location:Brooklyn, NY
- Reference Number:Seller: 43511stDibs: LU89384752873
Werkstätte Carl Auböck
In Vienna’s Neubau district, a beautiful Biedermeier townhouse has been home to the Werkstätte Carl Auböck for more than 100 years. Inside the workshop, where production continues to this day, countless objects line the shelves, walls, tabletops and desktops.
The Viennese artist and designer Carl Auböck II was one of the quirkiest and most delightful and collectible of modern designers. A rather odd duck in the world of decorative arts, he was a peculiar talent whose specialties included smaller desk accessories and tabletop pieces such as corkscrews, paperweights, letter openers, bookends and bottle stoppers. He rendered these pieces in a combination of metal — most often brass — and such elemental materials as leather, knobby wood and animal horn, creating forms that could be almost Surrealist, from hands and feet to keys, birds and amoebae.
As a boy, Auböck was precocious and artistic. He studied drawing and at the same time trained in the workshop of his father, Karl Heinrich Auböck, a popular maker of traditional bronze figurines and collectibles. In 1919, Carl II went to Germany to study at the Bauhaus, where he was a pupil of the progressive artist and theorist Johannes Itten. While the Bauhaus is most associated with the rigidly ordered, functionalist architecture of its directors Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, the school was in reality a liberal, spirited place — a crucible for imaginative, playful and avant-garde art and design. It was this spirit that imbued Carl II’s work from the time he left in 1921.
In 1922 or ’23, Carl Auböck II returned to Vienna to help care for his ailing father, and he took over the business. He created the Werkstätte Carl Auböck and a legacy that earned his objects cult status among collectors. The business was passed on to his descendants, who run the atelier that is still in operation today. Today, objects designed by Carl II make up 90 percent of Werkstätte Carl Auböck’s production, joined by the creations of architect and designer Carl IV, his grandson.
Vintage Auböck designs have a special character, a patina that only emphasizes how much the pieces have been loved and used. Carl Aubock II’s small furniture items — leather- or caned-sling magazine racks; free-edge wooden side tables with tubular bronze legs; wicker serving trolleys with turned beechwood wheels — are elegant and purposeful. His bijoux desktop objects, library tools, ashtrays and barware pieces evince a kind of mirthful practicality. They seem to ask: “If you need a corkscrew, or a paperweight, or a candlestick, why not make it fun as well as functional?” And indeed, why not?
Find a collection of vintage Werkstätte Carl Auböck mirrors, seating, tables, decorative objects and other furniture on 1stDibs.
- Carl Auböck Model #4224 'Hand' Brass Bottle OpenerBy Werkstätte Carl AuböckLocated in Glendale, CACarl Auböck Model #4224 'Hand' brass bottle opener. Designed in the 1950s, this incredibly refined and sculptural bottle opener is executed in polished brass. Price is per item. Th...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Austrian Mid-Century Modern Barware
MaterialsBrass
- Cigarette Box by Carl AuböckBy Werkstätte Carl AuböckLocated in Banská Štiavnica, SKBrass and wooden cigarette box, designed by Carl Auböck, shows a beautiful guilloche top surface. The brass shows fine patina, enriched by the contrast of the wooden sides of the box...Category
Vintage 1950s Austrian Mid-Century Modern Cigar Boxes and Humidors
MaterialsBrass
- Memphis Post Modern Lidded Ice Bucket for Taste Seller by SigmaBy Taste Seller By SigmaLocated in Los Angeles, CAA lidded post modern Memphis ice bucket for Taste Seller, c.1980s, Japan. The bucket features and geometric black red and teal pattern with cream outlining. The black lid has three tiers and is finished with a teal globe pull...Category
Late 20th Century Japanese Post-Modern Barware
MaterialsPlastic
- Moorish Bohemian Decorative Gilt Porcelain Flask with LidLocated in North Hollywood, CAMoorish decorative gilt porcelain flask with lid. The bottle is shaped into soft ripples and given a radiant gold finish. Nice decorative object with a lid in the shape of a Moorish ...Category
20th Century Indian Moorish Barware
MaterialsPorcelain
- Carl Auböck Box, Austria, 1960sBy Werkstätte Carl AuböckLocated in Berlin, DECarl Auböck horn and brass box, Austria 1960s.Category
Vintage 1960s Austrian Mid-Century Modern Decorative Boxes
MaterialsBrass
- Pair of Rattan Round Lidded Boxes, 1960sLocated in Barcelona, ESPair of rattan boxes with lid, Italy, 1960s These decorative Italian rattan lidded boxes were hand- crafted in the 1960s. To be used as rings boxes or toilette boxes, vide-poches or ...Category
20th Century Italian Mid-Century Modern Decorative Boxes
MaterialsRattan, Wicker, Cane
$874 / set