49 Facts About Hans Wegner

Hans Wegner's style is often described as Organic Functionality, a modernist school with emphasis on functionality.

Hans Wegner received several major design prizes in his lifetime, from the Lunning Prize in 1951 and the Grand Prix of the Milan Triennale in the same year, to the Prince Eugen Medal in Sweden and the Danish Eckersberg Medal.

At an early age, Hans Wegner showed interest in craft and could draw and create paper cuttings before he learned to walk.

Hans Wegner soon discovered he had a feeling for wood and developed an affinity towards the material.

Hans Wegner decided to become a designer with the aim of producing and selling his furniture.

Hans Wegner realized his skills needed improvement if he wished to fulfill his dream of opening his own workshop.

Hans Wegner garnered attention at school from his teachers for his developed drawing skills.

Hans Wegner's painting teacher tried to convince him to pursue a career as a portrait painter.

Hans Wegner participated at his first Cabinetmakers' Guild exhibition in 1938, where he presented the Stangerup Chair - named after the person who purchased it.

In 1938, Hans Wegner took a one-year leave from his studies to work on the Aarhus City Hall project on the recommendation of his teacher.

In 1940, Hans Wegner made what could be called the two most pivotal relationships in his life.

Hans Wegner met Inga Helbo, a secretary in Jacobsen's office, and they were married on November 9,1940.

Hans Wegner never did return to school to complete the carpentry program and, as a result, he never received instruction from the "father of Danish modern furniture design" Kaare Klint.

Hans Wegner continued to work for Jacobsen until 1943 when he opened an independent studio in Aarhus.

For Johannes Hansen's booth in the 1944 Cabinetmakers' Guild exhibition, Wegner created what might be considered his most decorative and most laborious piece: the Fish Cabinet.

Hans Wegner decided to produce it himself using a pocket knife, which took three weeks to assemble all of the roughly 3,000 pieces of wood.

Hans Wegner created the China Chair series for Fritz Hansen in 1944.

Hans Wegner saw a Chinese chair in a book by Ole Wanscher that served as inspiration for this chair series.

In 1947, Wegner designed the Peacock Chair for Johannes Hansen.

That year, Wegner presented three chairs for the annual exhibition of the Copenhagen Cabinetmakers' Guild while employed by Johannes Hansen: a three-part plywood shell chair, the Folding Chair, and the Round Chair.

Hans Wegner would allow Wegner to produce works across many factories at mass production and not be dependent on annual exhibits to market his works.

In 1951, Hans Wegner won the inaugural Lunning Prize along with Finnish designer Tapio Wirkkala.

Hans Wegner witnessed the industrialized furniture production of the US but preferred to adhere to Denmark's traditional methods and rejected multiple offers, including one from Raymond Loewy, to move his furniture production to the US.

US imports of Hans Wegner's furniture declined in the late 1960s due to an ill-fated deal with Georg Jensen, Inc.

In 1969, the Knoll furniture company acquired the US distribution rights for the Wegner designs manufactured by Johannes Hansen in Copenhagen.

The Cabinetmakers' Guild Exhibition, which Wegner presented new designed with Johannes Hansen, held its final event in 1966 after too few cabinetmakers remained in Copenhagen to sustain it.

Hans Wegner gave the Salesco board of directors an ultimatum: choose him or Foss-Pedersen.

Hans Wegner vowed he would never again set foot in any of the Salesco companies; the companies would continue to manufacture any existing designs items but Hans Wegner would not create new furniture for them.

Hans Wegner kept his promise and never worked with any of these companies again.

Hans Wegner initially took Salesco's side and told a newspaper that it would be difficult to continue to work with Getama.

However, Hans Wegner changed course after he parted with Salesco and continued to produce furniture for Getama.

Getama and Hans Wegner saw continued success in their residence halls furniture series designed for Denmark's growing university population.

Hans Wegner's chairs began to look more Scandinavian, functionalist, and Apollonian.

Hans Wegner started using lighter colored woods as foreign and exotic woods became less appealing to consumers.

Hans Wegner hired his daughter Marianne, who was a designer, to work at his design studio in 1973.

Hans Wegner's furniture was now in such demand that he was cited as "the man of the hour in a hot collecting market" in a 1998 New York Times article.

Hans Wegner retired in 1993 and his daughter Marianne took over his studio.

On January 26,2007, Hans Wegner passed away at the age of 92.

Hans Wegner's family has been supportive and offered up items from his design studio to display at the museum.

Hans Wegner's style is known for taking traditional elements and pushing them to extreme tolerances and distillations.

Unlike his contemporaries, Hans Wegner did not focus on materials like fiberglass and plastics, steel, or polyurethane foam.

Hans Wegner often drew upon his own designs to create new chairs.

Many of Hans Wegner's chairs borrow characteristics from his prior works.

Hans Wegner was dissatisfied with the way that this looked and wrapped the backrest in cane to hide what he considered to be an unsightly design.

Unhappy with this compromise and the deceptive illusion that the arms and backrest were constructed from a single piece of wood, Hans Wegner later updated the design to use a zigzag patterned finger joint to connect the three parts.

Hans Wegner created a hook so the chair could be hung on the wall to save space.

In 1944 Hans Wegner began a series of chairs inspired by a portrait of Danish merchants sitting in traditional Ming chairs.

The Flag Halyard was inspired by a trip to the beach, during which Hans Wegner carved out the form in the sand.

Hans Wegner created this office chair inspired by Doctor Egill Snorrason's critique of how Danish furniture ignored ergonomics.