Noomi Backhausen (1938-2011) worked at Söholm Keramik located in Rønne on the island of Bornholm, Denmark from 1966 until it closed down in 1990. While there, she created designs that decorated pieces by Paul Brandborg. In 1996, she founded her own pottery, also in Rønne.
Examples of her work – including wall plaques, vases, teapots, wall sconces and lamp bases – are readily available from Etsy, eBay, 1stDibs and Pamono.
Jacob Jensen (1926-2015) was a Danish industrial designer (the first in the country to have graduated in the subject).
He had a long-term relationship designing audio equipment for Bang & Olufsen for over a quarter of a century. Included in his output of almost 250 different designs is the record player Beogram 4000, portable radio Beolit 400, sound systems BeoMaster 500 and BeoMaster 1900 and the company’s first headphones, the U70.
He designed a range of products for other companies; from furniture to watches, telephones to kettles. He even created the popular Margrethe melamine bowls for Rosti (named after Queen Margrethe of Denmark). Our favourites though, are his little wooden figures – Vikings, Eskimos and… aliens! They can retail for hundreds of pounds!
In my view, constructing a fountain pen, writing a poem, producing a play or designing a locomotive, all demand the same components, the same ingredients: perspective, creativity, new ideas, understanding and first and foremost, the ability to rework, almost infinitely, over and over. That ‘over and over’ is for me the cruellest torture.
The only way I can work is to make 30-40 models before I find the right one. The question is, when do you find the right one? My method is, when I have reached a point where I think, ‘O.K., that’s it, there it is’, I put the model on a table in the living room, illuminate it, and otherwise spend the evening as usual, and go to bed. The next morning I go in and look at it, knowing with 100 percent certainty that I have 6-7 seconds to see and decide whether it’s right or wrong. If I look at it longer, I automatically compensate. ‘Oh, it’s not too high,’ and, ‘It’s not so bad.’ There are only those 6-7 seconds; then I make some notes as to what’s wrong. Finished. After breakfast, I make the changes. That’s the only way I know. Jacob Jensen
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We’ve been publishing our weekly Designer Desire series for about 3 years now, so you’d forgive us for forgetting who we have, and haven’t, featured so far. One of the items that we get contacted about most often is a vintage Ib Antoni poster (pictured in the montage above). It advertises Danish Fortnight at Neiman-Marcus in Dallas, Texas; we could have sold it dozens of times over! We’re really surprised that we haven’t researched and shared some of the other fabulous designs that he created.
Ib Antoni (1929-1973) was born in Esbjerg, Denmark. He was commissioned by over 150 international brands and companies such as Carlsberg, UNICEF, Philips, Lurpak, Volvo and Life Magazine.
As well as advertising and illustration, Antoni designed textiles and porcelain for Royal Copenhagen and Bing and Grøndahl. In 1968, he illustrated a sweet, little children’s book, Merry Cherry, a story by Henning Nystad about a starling in love with an unattainable cherry. The cover illustration can be seen in the montage above – second from bottom, on the right.
In 1973 at the age of only 44, he tragically died following an arson attack at Copenhagen’s Hotel Hafnia. His legacy work is being reproduced for sale by his family and a small number of original examples can still be found on Etsy.
Visit the official Ib Antoni Instagram feed to see lots of other examples of his work and a few really interesting contemporaneous photographs of his designs out in the wild!
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It was my birthday a couple of weeks ago and, as has become customary, Justin bought me a piece of vintage Scandi jewellery. This time, something by Danish designer, Niels Erik From (1908-1980). The item he bought me can be seen in the top pair of images above; a beautiful silver pendant with a cabochon rhodochrosite stone.
Beginning in 1931, From sold his work via his own retail premises. It was only in 1944 in the southern Danish town of Nakskov that he founded his smithy. He began his career producing designs in the Skønvirke style – a Danish movement similar to Art Nouveau. It’s his later work in the clean, modernist, geometric style which I far prefer. Ironically, these examples were created by other designers under From’s name.
If you like his designs, there are always examples for sale on Etsy, eBay and specialist vintage Scandinavian jewellery dealers. I think Justin bought this latest gift from Scandinavian Silver.
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1st Dibs | Auktionsverket | Cream and Chrome | Dorotheum | John Kelly | Modernity
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