Model 4007 Table Lamp by Christian Dell for Kaiser Idell, 1930s

Industrial designer, silversmith, and teacher Christian Dell was born in 1893 in Offenbach, Germany. While information on Dell is limited, multiple sources note he apprenticed as a silversmith in Hanau prior to studying at the Weimar School of Applied Art. Between 1922 and 1925, Dell served as master of the metal workshop at the Bauhaus in Weimar; he is credited with playing a formative role in shaping the Bauhaus’s metalworking curriculum. During this time, he also designed crafted tableware in copper and silver.

In 1926, after the Weimar Bauhaus closed, Dell was appointed director of the then-new metalwork course at the Frankfurt School of Art, where he remained until 1933—at which time the Nazis dismissed him. While in Frankfurt, in addition to teaching and working as a silversmith, Dell began his career as a lighting designer. Standout designs from this period include the Rondella (1927-28) and Polo Populär (1929) desk lights; both were initially manufactured by the Rondella factory at Oberursel and later by Bünte & Remmler in Frankfurt. Other noteworthy pieces include the Dell-lamp type K (1930) as well as the Kaiser idell range (1930s), the latter of which appeared for the first time in catalogue in 1936 and was produced by the company Gebr. Kaiser & Co in Neheim-Hüsten. (Notably, many of Dell’s lighting designs incorporated his own name into their titles.)

After World War II, Dell manufactured silver goods and opened a jeweler’s shop in Wiesbaden, which operated from 1948 to 1955. He died in Wiesbaden in 1974.

Danish cabinetmaker Fritz Hansen founded his eponymous furniture manufacturing company with his son Christian in Copenhagen in 1885. The first three decades were dedicated to hand-making wood and iron frames for upholstered furniture. In 1915, however, Christian began to introduce industrial processes, such as steam-bending wood, which enabled the family business to mass-produce at a larger scale.

In 1932, Christian brought in his own sons, Fritz and Søren, who updated the product line to include more modernist styles, like Søren’s Thonet-inspired DAN Chair (1930) and a cantilevered wicker and tubular steel chair by architect Mogens Lassen (1933). Other early classics in the Fritz Hansen catalog include Kaare Klint’s Church Chair (1936), Hans Wegner’s China Chair (1944), and Børge Mogensen’s Spoke Back Sofa (1945).

During the 1950s—thanks especially to the contributions of architect Arne Jacobsen—Fritz Hansen entered its golden era, creating some of the most iconic Scandinavian designs of the 20th century. Arne Jacobsen’s Ant Chair (1952), Swan Sofa (1958) and Egg Chair & Ottoman (1958), as well as later designs by Verner Panton, Piet Hein, and Grete Jalk, all helped to cement Fritz Hansen’s legacy as one of the most beloved producers of high quality, simple-yet-elegant, Danish modern furniture.

In 1979, after 107 years of family ownership, Fritz Hansen was bought out by Skandinavisk Holding and is now known as The Republic of Fritz Hansen. Pieces from the company’s long history can be found in nearly every design museum collection there is, from MoMA and Cooper Hewitt in New York to the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney. Arne Jacobsen’s collaboration with Fritz Hansen was the subject of the Siéntate Siéntete exhibition, hosted by the Chamber of Architects in Madrid in 2010.  

* All images courtesy of Republic of Fritz Hansen.