The Egg Chair

From the 1950s onwards Jacobsen became one of the dominant figures in Danish architecture, but outside of Denmark he made his large inroads in his work as a furniture and product designer. As well as the Swan, Egg and the Series 7 chairs, he was also responsible for another 20th century classic, the Cylinda Line stainless steel set and the AJ flatware.

Arne Jacobsen initially was trained as a mason deciding to study architecture at the Royal Danish Academy of Arts, Copenhagen eventually graduating from there in 1927.  From his graduation until 1930, he worked in the architectural office of Paul Holsoe. He then decided to establish his own design office, and continue to operate until he died in 1971.

He was also a professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy of Arts from 1956 in Copenhagen. Some of his better known projects are St. Catherine´s College in Oxford, and the SAS Hotel located in Copenhagen.

Here is a chornological list of his built work:

Bellevue Theatre (1935-36)

Århus City Hall (1939-42)

Søllerød Town Hall (1940-42)

Søholm semi-detached houses in Klampenborg (1950-54)

Rødovre Town Hall (1957)

Glostrup Town Hall (1958)

The Munkegård School in Copenhagen (1955-59)

SAS Royal Hotel Copenhagen (1958-1960)

Toms Chocolate Factories in Ballerup (1961)

Danmarks National bank (started in 1965)

St Catherine’s College, University of Oxford (1964-66)

Hamburger Elektrizitaetswerke Verwaltungsgebaeude in Hamburg

Arne Jacobsen reflected on his career, a few Months before his death in 1971, "The fundamental factor is proportion," he concluded. "Proportion is precisely what makes the old Greek temples beautiful…And when we look at some of the most admired buildings of the Renaissance or the Baroque, we notice that they are all well-proportioned. That is the essential thing." Here is a quick gallery of Arne Jacobsen work.

 image credit: drewleavy

Fast food chain McDonald’s may have to change its plans for revamping some of its European stores after being accused of "piracy" by Frtiz Hansen.

From the TIME article
"McDonald’s approached us some six months ago to help revitalize and revamp their European restaurants," Fritz Hansen CEO Jacob Holm told TIME in Copenhagen. "We developed Arne Jacobsen chairs in special colors and began deliveries." In particular Avanzi and McDonald’s chose The Egg and The Seven chairs, two of Jacobsen’s most iconic creations. Jacobsen, who died in 1971, contracted Fritz Hansen to be the sole licensed manufacturer of his designs in 1934, meaning nobody else can make an original Egg (created in 1958) or Seven (1955). Approximately 2,500 of those chairs have already been sold to McDonald’s, according to Holm. "But," he says, "we discovered that terrible copies of our furniture were also being used in the U.K. That is unacceptable. We simply will not work with people who use originals where they have to and copies elsewhere, legal or otherwise."

According  to copyright law’s in the United Kingdom, McDonald’s is technically doing nothing wrong. Since the U.K. rights on the designs of the chairs have expired, which holds that the rights on a design last a maximum of 25 years, instead of 70 as in much of Europe — British furniture stores and websites are legitimately selling copies of the Egg chair for a fraction of the original price.

28 McDonald’s in the U.K. that were refurbished in 2006 and fitted with all original Fritz Hansen chairs. By the end of this year, another 100 restaurants will have gone through a "re-image": some using all originals, some using reproductions and some using a combination of both. "While the reproduction chairs are naturally very similar to the original design, there are differences," says Homer. "No attempt has been made to ‘pass off’ reproduction chairs as originals in any references or labeling."

"The fact that McDonald’s has chosen to use pirated copies is even more surprising since the company itself is legendary across the world in pursuing trademark and copyright suits to safeguard its product and name," Mr Holm said.

McDonald’s admitted using chairs that were similar-looking reproductions of the iconic designs, but said the company had not acted improperly.
 

Additional Articles covering the story:

Telegraph.co.uk

TIME

NYTIMES

Here are a few videos of  arne jacobsen designs in action.  If any of your own egg chairs need some prime time exposure.  Contact me and I will place the video here.

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A Euromaxx program about the danish designer Arne Jacobsen. recorded in (and around) Copenhagen.

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Fritz Hansen "Egg" chair with "Random" shelving from MDF Italia

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1958 Arne Jacobsen Egg Chair

photographer:babymammoth
Credit +License

Shopping Guide:

Here is a breakdown of some stores that carry the Egg chair, there seems to be fairly consistent pricing but occasionally good sales do arise on Arne Jacobsen’s furniture.  If you discover any other reputable stores, let me know and I will place them here.

Authenitic + Authorized Reproductions:

The real deal- Altough at first glance these might come across as very expensive you will gain a lot in terms of quality, resale value and knowing that your money goes back to the designer in some form or another.

A red Republic of Fritz Hansen label will usually accompany an original. 
+This measure took effect in 2006
+Includes the year the product was manufactured.

Here is a complete list of authorized dealers: Fritz Hansen

Takeaway:
You can’t go wrong here, Design Within Reach is always a good choice and also has some brick and morter stores in case something goes wrong, or you want to test drive the chair before you buy online.

 
Used Egg Chairs:

Lisited below are the current auctions for Egg chairs on ebay, once in a while vintage pieces will go on sale and there are often brand new Egg chairs available from here as well.  

Never bought any thing from Ebay before?  Here are a few good resources to get you started and protect yourself and your money:

+99 Tips for buying and selling on ebay
+Apartment Therapy: Buying on Eaby
+About.com: Tips for buying furniture on Ebay

Takeaway:
There are definitely still good deals to be had here. As always, make sure you have good communication with the seller, do your research before hand and be smart about how you bid.

Egg Chair Knockoffs + Replicas:
Takeaway:

If you can afford the real thing, buy it. Both because it is ligitimate, but also for the fit and quality of construction of an original.

However, if you cannot afford the real thing, buy the best "reproduction" you can afford.  My own philosphy  is that by having a replica, you are promoting the "brand" of the original on the way to owning an original piece.

Something else to take into consideration is that most of these classic designers have passed away, and the producers have taken many liberties with their work in the form of special releases, creating chairs out of colors that did not exist, etc.  Also, many of these classic furniture designers were trying to make innovations with production methods and materials in hopes their designes could be used by masses, not just the wealthy elite. 

Saying that, you usually get what you pay for when it comes to cheaper egg chair replicas.  People have seem to have good experiences with Exclusively Home and Inside Avenue, I have tried to list stores with good reputations below, If you know of any others please leave them in a comment below.

A few stores that have negative feedback from around the web include:  White on White(report)   modernclassicsdirect + JMCTRADING.CO.UK(report)

Hauswerks.com (report)
 

image credit:svanes

Basic Details:

Arne Jacobsen, 1958

Created for the the largest hotel in Denmark at the time the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen, which was owned by the airline of the same name. and became the first skyscraper in the country’s history. 

When it first debuted it was called the "glass cigarbox", the steel structure remains a monument to the Modernist movement to this day.  This reputation not only has to do with the buildings desings but also because of what was held within.  Jacobsen’s philosophy was described as "from spoon to city" and the Egg chair and the Swan chair all the way to the door handles, cutlery and martini mixers were designed as a singular unit.  Each piece an important piece of the harmonious design.

Original Egg Chairs, made by the Danish company Fritz Hansen are priced at the $5,000 + range, and sell by the thousands pushing.  Cheaper reproductions, priced at anything from $600 to $2,000, have been increasing in popularity (shopping guide). Original examples from the 1950s have sold at New York auction houses for up to $70,000.

Construction + Finish:

1,300 stitches are used to add the upholstery

Shell:
Created with of polyurethane foam with glass fibre reinforcement.

Tilt mechanism:
Made of steel sheet, steel tubing and spring steel. The adjustment handle is made of polished stainless steel.  This tilt feature adjusts according to the users individual weight. 

Base:
Consists of a satin-polished swivel centre part of welded steel tubing (dia. 38x 2 mm), a spindle of dia. 28 mm machining steel and a 4-star base in injection moulded aluminium.

Upholstery:

Fabric-Standard fabrics for the Egg include Kvadrat Hallingdal, Tonus, Divina, Topas and Fame and Comfort

LeatherClassic leather (5 colors); Natural leather (1 color); Elegance (3 colors) and White leather 
+ 50th Anniversary Egg Chair

Dimensions:
Depth: 79 (95) cm
Width: 86 cm
Height: 107 cm
Total weight: 18.1 kg

Photos: 
See our photo gallery of the Egg chair in the wild.

Videos:
Some Youtube videos on Arne Jacobsen and the Egg Chair

3d Models: Sketchup + 3dmax

Manufacturers:
Looking to bring the Egg chair into your store? Here is a list of Suppliers.

Shopping:
Looking for the best stores or cheapest price? We have browsed the web for you and have a list of stores that carry the Egg chair.  Check out the Shopping guide.

+ Egg t-shirt

About the Designer: Arne Jacobsen

magnus* Credit +License

Articles + Resources:

Fritz Hansen: Homepage
Wikipedia: Egg chair

NYTimes: Egg and I
Interior Design.net: What is it about that chair?
The Independent: The man who invented a golden egg
NotCot: 50 years of the Egg
House Beautiful: Foyer redesign

Blog Posts:

+The pod/stereo/bubble/ball/eggs
+Nothin’ but egg
+3d leather covering
+Fjord chair: the new egg
+Ikea’s Egg
+Egg Mating
+Mcjacobsen

If you are interested in seeing more photos of Arne’s work and how people are using them in their own homes,  I would recommended checking out his Flickr Group, or the Archlanders.com House Shots blog.

 Jacobsen was interested in the idea of "total design", often including clauses in his contract: "Professor Jacobsen should undertake as much as possible of the landscape design and the design of fixtures and fittings."  This attention to detail and harmonious design led to some of the better known designs of the modern era. 

From his AJ cutlery/flatware, to his doorknobs and watches, and of course what he is most famous for his furniture designs featured below.   This attention to detail and total design packages are probably best exemplified in his architecture at The Royal Hotel from 1956-61 in Copenhagen and St Catherine’s College.

(1952) The Ant

The chair takes advantage of techniques from theaircraft industry .

Inspired by Ray and Charles Eames designs.

In order to press the double shell as one piece the chair had to be narrow in the transition between seat and back. 

Originally onstructed with 3 legs to ensure the stability ,later a four-legged variant was developed for Rodovre town hall.

Materials:
Form-moulded, laminated veneer with a tubular steel frame.  The chair itself consists of 9 transversed layers of veneer with 2 layers of linen glued-in. Model 3100 has 3 legs in mirror chromed steel. Model 3101 has 4 in mirror or satin chromed steel.

Dimensions:
W:19 x D:19 x H:30.25, SH:17.25".
Weight: 4 kg.

(1958) The Swan

The Swan was a technologically innovative chair in 1958.  Designed for the Royal Hotel in Copenhagen.

Materials:
A moulded coherent shell of synthetic material on an aluminium star base. A layer of cold foam covers the shell, which is covered by a choice Kvadrat-fabric or leather upholstery in a wide range of colours, with a swivel base in steel.

DImensions:
W:76 x D:68 x SH:75 cm (H:31 x W:30 x D:27, SH:29.5")
 

Interested in learning more about the Swan chair? her is a resource site dedicated to the design-swan-chair.com

 (1955) Series 7

Part of the Series 7 group, which was awarded a Grand Prix at the 1957 Milan Triennale. 

The series includes:

chairs with arms
swivel chairs on castors and a
pedestal chair 

Materials:
Molded maple plywood seat with tubular steel base.

Dimensions:
19"w x 20.5"d x 30"h (50 x 52 x 78 cm, SH: 46,5 cm).

Interested in learning more abou the Series7 chair?  Series7chair.com

(1965) Oxford Chair

The Oxford chair series for office, meeting and conference use was originally designed for St. Catherine College in Oxford.

The chair originally made in the tall version in teak with form-moulded wooden base and as a prototype with armrests and all-wood frame.

Available in cloth or leather in a range of colours with a swivel base in steel, in both a tall and a short version and with or without armrests and/or sheels.

Cylina	Flatware	Lighting
Clocks	Watches	To see a complete list of these designs, visit our post on Arne Jacobsen Objects.

Here is a listing of a few lesser known Arne Jacobsen furniture designs:

Quick Facts + Links:

+ Born in Copenhagen.

+ Graduated from the Academy of Arts, Copenhagen in 1928

+ Won a silver medal for a chair design at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs in Paris.  This is also  where he discovers the work of  Le Corbusier’s.

+ Spent two years in Sweden as an exile during the war. 

+ Nickname the "Fat man"

+ In 1956 Designs the Egg and Swan chairs as well as the Aj Cutlery all for his latest building the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen

+ His chair the Series 7, was used as a prop for the famous Christine Keeler’s nude portrait, and the Profumo Affair.

+ Arne Jacobsen Died in Copenhagen 1971

Biography:

As an architect and industrial designer, Jacobsen became one of the most influential Danish architect and designer of the 20 th century .  Known as much for his furniture design: such as Swan, Egg and Series 7 chairs as he is for his famous works of architecture: SAS Royal Hotel and St Catherine’s College in Oxford.

Overall Jacobsen did not engage in  theory-building as did many of his colleagues in the modernist movement, He was heavily influenced by their designs early on and was inspired by the work of Mies-Corbu-and Charles and Ray Eames. Jacobsen tended to be able to stray from the pure modernist as once was quoted as saying  "You can always see a thing from two sides, if only one has a little imagination"

Born in Copenhagen in 1902, Arne Jacobsen worked as an apprentice bricklayer until he began his studies at the Royal Academy of Art in 1924. This background working with materials would prove to play an important role in his work  later on.

As a student, Jacobsen went to Paris in 1925 for an International Exhibition of Arts Décoratifs School, where he won the silver medal for his chair design. Here is where he was first introduced to the work of Le Corbusier in the L ‘spirit of Modernism pavilion.  Before he finished his studies Jacobsen  visited Berlin, where he learned of the rationalist architecture of Mies Van Der Rohe and Walter Groupius. Their work had an impact on some of his earlier project completed in Denmark.

In 1929, the 27-year-old Jacobsen entered his life-size model of the”House of the Future” (designed with his partner, Flemming Lassen) which won them 1st prize in the Academic Architects’ Association’s Housing and Building Fair.  The structure was temporarily erected that year at the Housing and Building Exhibition in Copenhagen. Some of the highlighs of their house design included:

Windows that rolled down like car windows,
Conveyor tube for the mail
Helicopter Pad on the roof
Kitchen stocked with ready-made meals.

The project was eventually dismantled, but today a group of Danish Architects are attempting to rebuild the ”House of the Future” .

Architectural commissions disappeared during World War II, Being Jewish, Jacobsen was in danger of the Nazi occupation of Denmark. In 1943 he fled to neighboring Sweden. Two years later he returned to Denmark in time for the countries urgent need new residential and public buildings.  This allowed Jacobsen to design some of his bigger commisions.

During 1950′s, Jacobsen after seeing some of the work of Charles and Ray Eames and their bent plywood designs became interested in product designs again.  But Jacobsen,  considered himself foremost an architect. ”He didn’t call himself a designer; he didn’t even like the word,” said Scott Poole, a professor of architecture at Virginia Tech 

By the end of 1950′s, Jacobsen was given the opportunity to put his thories into a comprehensive design package, with the Ari terminal SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen. He designed almost every element of the building, from its glassy exterior structure to the Cylinda ashtrays, AJ Handles and the dining rooms flatware  This is also the birthplace of the Swan and Egg chairs.  This building was not met with the kindest reception and Jacobsen has said the following about the hotel:

"Well, yes, they call it the punch card, and it’s funny, for that is actually what it looks like when the windows are open on a hot summer’s day. It has been called a lot of different things. Svend Erik Møller called it the ‘glass cigarbox’. And many people thought it was a terribly ugly building, and many may still think so. At least, it came in first when they held a competition for the ugliest building in Copenhagen."

Arne Jacobsen when asked to reflect on some of his career said that proportion is one of the main factors in his work, he was on to say "The proportion is exactly what makes the beautiful ancient Egyptian temples … And if we look at some of the most admired buildings of the Renaissance and Baroque, we noticed that they were all well-proportioned. Here is the basic thing.  You can see a complete list and corresponding images of his work the-egg-chair.com/arne-jacobsen-architecture

Awards + Recognition: Arne Jacobsen

 + In 1927 he even won a gold medal with an academy project for a national open air museum situated in Klampenborg, Bellevue.

+ 1930 he won a design competition entitled ‘The House of the Future

+ 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs, where he won a silver medal for a chair design

+ 1966 Jacobsen wins the competition to design the new National Bank of Denmark

+ Won the competition for the office Buildings for the Hamburg Power station (1970)

+ The Cylinda-line has won awards from The Danish Society of Industrial Design and The American Institute of Interior Designers.

Additional Resources | Interviews | Articles:

ARTICLE: Independent.co.uk

ARTICLE: Design Museum

MOMA: Design Collection

Design Addict: Biography

Arne Jacobsen.com

Fritz Hansen.com

Wikipedia: Arne Jacobsen