The Egg Chair
The Egg Chair, one of the most enduring symbols of the Modernist movement in design, was created in a Danish garage over fifty years ago. Today, the quirky futuristic armchair is more extraordinarily popular than ever before. For five decades, the unmistakable swivel-seats have brightened up
fashionable interiors all over the world, starred in Hollywood blockbusters such as Men in Black, and jazzed-up countless trendy hotels, offices, bars and clubs. Genuine Egg Chairs, still made by the Danish company Fritz Hansen and priced at a hefty £5,000, sell by the thousand all over the world. Cheaper reproductions, at anything from £500 to £2,000, have been snapped up by the million. Right now, they've never been more popular and original examples from the 1950s have sold at auction in New York for up to $70,000.
For all this, we must thank one man: Arne Jacobsen, a reclusive architect who rarely left his Copenhagen studio. He designed the Egg Chair as part of a commission to create a new landmark hotel in the centre of the city in the 1950s. The SAS Royal Hotel, which was owned by the airline of the same name, was to be the largest hotel in Denmark, and the first skyscraper in the country's history. Compared by critics to a 'glass cigarbox', the rectangular steel structure remains a sort of monument to the Modernist movement, and Jacobsen, who is arguably the most important Scandinavian designer of the twentieth century, pioneered the Modernist movement in which architects began to design both the interiors, and the actual day-to-day contents of their buildings.
'At the SAS hotel, this meant he created everything from the door handles and cutlery to the carpets and colour scheme,' says Gemma Curtin, a curator at the Design Museum.'His philosophy was described as “from spoon to city”, and the chair was part of that. The Egg Chair has soft sides. It's really organic, and stems from nature: it looks like a broken shell that a little chick has just run out of. It's sophisticated and minimalist, but still has a sense of fun. You can't imagine a child walking past without wanting to jump in. It's just incredibly warm and relaxing.'
Jacobsen built the prototype of the chair in his garage in Copenhagen in 1957. After several minor adjustments, it was unveiled to the public at a local design show. When the hotel opened, Egg Chairs filled the lobby and bar area, and were found in every bedroom. Fritz Hansen, then an up-market, family-owned furniture manufacturer, was handed a contract to build replicas for fashion-conscious homeowners. In keeping with the tradition that true classics develop gradually, the Egg Chair took a while to catch on, and initial sales were disappointing. But by the mid 1960s, buyers had grown to love its revolutionary design.
The design expert Stephen Bayley includes the Egg Chair in Design: Intelligence Made Visible, his new guide to modern design classics co-authored by Sir Terence Conran. He believes that 'chair design ended' in the late 1950s. 'This was when Charles Eames produced his Aluminium Group classics, and Arne Jacobsen his Egg,' he says. 'Since then, there have been no changes in human physiology, nor the discovery of any relevant new materials, and no genuine improvements in what a modern chair might be. Jacobsen's achievement was to turn the austerity of functionalism into something elegant and spare, yet luxurious as well. He thought of architecture and furniture design as two expressions of the same desire to achieve both physical and psychological comfort.'
Antique Egg Chairs can now command a staggering sum. 'I've watched this grow and grow since the birth of the modern design auction in 1999 or 2000,' says James Zematis, the director of twentieth-century design at Sotheby's in New York. 'There's a surging demand for all postwar Danish furniture.' The sky-high prices have led to a burgeoning market in Egg Chair thefts, which Fritz Hansen are attempting to combat by holding a database of serial numbers which all genuine Eggs have carved into the foot. 'And you can always tell a fake,' says the company's spokesman, Jan Helleskov. 'I look at things like the stitching and the dimensions, and the basic shape and the fabric. We have never come across a fake that we couldn't spot at a glance.'
Fritz Hansen still sells thousands of the original model each year. Cheaper reproduction pieces are also made by a host of fashionable furniture retailers. 'They've been incredibly popular in the past year or so,' says John Cohen, the manager of Modern Classics Direct, one such company. 'I think the biggest reason is actually the increasing number of new-build properties on the market. Egg-style chairs sit very well with minimalist architecture. You don't often see many of them being sold to people who own period properties. All designs go in and out of fashion, of course, but with the Egg, you always know it'll eventually come back in.'
1
Which adjective, used later in the first paragraph, reinforces the idea that the Egg Chair was 'quirky' ?
a) Unmistakable
b) Trendy
c)Hefty
d) Sought-after
2
. What do we learn about the SAS Royal Hotel in the second paragraph?
a) Only parts of it were designed by Arne Jacobsen
b) Not everybody appreciated its design at the time
c) It was made of materials not previously used in Denmark
d) Parts of it has since been turned into a museum of architecture
3
According to Gemma Curtin, the Egg Chair
a) Was inspired by aspects of the natural world
b) Has not always been taken seriously by designers
c) Is more practical than many people imagine it will be
d) Reflects a philosophy no longer important in modern design
4
In the fourth paragraph, we learn that when the Egg Chair first went on show
a) It had design faults that were later rectified
b) It was already being mass-produced by a company
c) It did not immediately become a commercial success
d) It as recognized as a design that would become highly influential
5
The writer quotes Jan Helleskov in order to show how
a) Worried the original makers are about fakes
b) The original makers help chair owners to avoid theft
c) Well made an original chair from the 1960s actually is
d) Easy it for the original makers to identify a reproduction
1/a
2/b
3/a
4/c
5/d