Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
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 The modernists rejected both natural and historical references and relied primarily on industrial materials such as metal, glass, plywood, and, later, plastics.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.
Late 18th Century Portuguese Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Wood
1660s French Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Glass, Mahogany
1690s Italian Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Glass, Wood
1950s Italian Vintage Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Brass
1970s Italian Vintage Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Cut Glass, Beech
Late 20th Century American Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Brass
19th Century Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Leather, Oak
1810s German Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Walnut
1950s French Vintage Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Mahogany
19th Century English Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Walnut
1820s German Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Elm, Walnut
1960s French Vintage Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Slate
Late 18th Century Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Mahogany
Early 1900s English Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Hardwood
1960s Italian Vintage Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Walnut
1690s Italian Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Glass, Wood
Early 17th Century Indonesian Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Petrified Wood
Early 17th Century Indonesian Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Petrified Wood
17th Century Indonesian Antique Modern Coffee and Cocktail Tables
Steel