Name: Mid-Century Modern George Nakashima Sofa
Brand: George Nakashima
Price: 30000 USD
Availability: InStock

Mid-Century Modern George Nakashima Sofa

View Similar Items

Caola Sofa, Sergio Rodrigues, Brazilian Mid-Century Modern

Mid Century Modern Floral Patterned 3 Seater Sofa on Wheels

Mid-Century Modern Sculptural Sofa Model "Värend" Carl Malmsten, 1942

Danish Brown Leather 2 Seat Mid-Century Modern Sofa Armchairs Available

Mid-Century Modern 801 Sofa by Brazilian Designer Jorge Zalszupin, 1959

Mid-Century Modern Cube Sofa by Brazilian Designer Jorge Zalszupin, 1970s

1960s Swedish Curved Sofa & Chair Johannes Andersen Trensums Mid-Century Modern

Mid-Century Australian Modern Teak Sofa & Armchairs by Parker Furniture, 1950s

Pair of Vintage Elegant Mid-century Scandinavian Modern Brown Leather Sofas

Pierre Jeanneret, French Mid-Century Modern, Sofa Set, X-Leg, Chandigarh, 1960s

Pierre Jeanneret Attr., French Mid-Century Modern, Bridge Sofa Set, Chandigarh

Mid-Century Modern Leather Patchwork Lounge Sofa/Living Room Set/5 1960s

Shop All George Nakashima

George Nakashima

A master woodworker and M.I.T.-trained architect, George Nakashima was the leading light of the American Studio furniture movement. Along with Wharton Esherick, Sam Maloof and Wendell Castle, Nakashima was an artisan who disdained industrial methods and materials in favor of a personal, craft-based approach to the design. What sets Nakashima apart is the poetic style of his work, his reverence for wood and the belief that his furniture could evince — as he put it in the title of his 1981 memoir — The Soul of a Tree.

Born in Spokane, Washington, to Japanese immigrants, Nakashima traveled widely after college, working and studying in Paris, Japan and India, and at every stop he absorbed both modernist and traditional design influences. The turning point in Nakashima’s career development came in the United States in 1942, when he was placed in an internment camp for Asian-Americans in Idaho. There, Nakashima met a master woodcarver who tutored him in Japanese crafting techniques. A former employer won Nakashima’s release and brought him to bucolic New Hope, Pennsylvania, where Nakashima set up a studio and worked for the rest of his life.

Nakashima’s singular aesthetic is best captured in his custom-made tables and benches — pieces that show off the grain, burls and whorls in a plank of wood. He left the “free edge,” or natural contour, of the slab un-planed, and reinforced fissures in the wood with “butterfly” joints. Almost all Nakashima seating pieces have smooth, milled edges. Nakashima also contracted with large-scale manufacturers to produce carefully supervised editions of his designs. Knoll has offered his Straight chair — a modern take on the spindle-backed Windsor chair — since 1946; the now-defunct firm Widdicomb-Mueller issued the Shaker-inspired Origins collection in the 1950s.

Nelson Rockefeller in 1973 gave Nakashima his single largest commission: a 200-piece suite for his suburban New York estate. Today, Nakashima furniture is collected by both the staid and the fashionable: his work sits in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian Institution, as well as in the homes of Steven Spielberg, Brad Pitt, Diane von Furstenberg and the late Steve Jobs.