POUL HENNINGSEN (PH)

A common theme throughout Poul Henningsen’s life that can be observed from his very beginnings: his desire to design and craft items by hand. In his earliest years, Poul Henningsen’s zeal for ‘making things’ took the form of items made on a workbench he was gifted at the age of three. Later, his creativity manifested itself in paintings, before he trained as a carpenter and then as a stone-mason. These artisanal craft skills of two and three dimensional manufacture were all acquired prior to PH’s eventual qualification as an architect, giving him not just theoretical knowledge of design – but crucially, a deep interest and understanding in what would work in practice in home and building design.

Forget all you know about Danish design and start again with Poul Henningsen or just the PH he used as his signature: simple, functional and to the point. Everything he produced from architecture and furniture to cultural critique and poetry follows this one single line of thought. Born in 1894, Poul Henningsen’s early life was considered rather unconventional at the time. The fourth child of writer Agnes Henningsen and the son of liberal writer Carl Ewald, PH was born in to a highly creative and rather non-traditional family environment that by it’s very nature challenged the concept of ‘traditional Danish society’. Undoubtably, PH’s childhood enabled him to feel that he was free to undertake a ‘non-traditional’ and creative path as he grew older as it had already been demonstrated by his parents that this was not only acceptable, but also to be applauded.

Illuminated Living

Many of Poul Henningsen’s designs are as relevant today as they were in the first half of the 21st Century. Having become one of Denmark’s authorities on lighting theory, Poul Henningsen designed the PH lamp in 1925, a lighting icon inspired by the way natural light falls through the foliage of a tree, providing illumination that is devoid of obtrusive glare. A winner of a gold medal at the World Fair in Paris in the 1920s, today the PH lamp is still in manufacture and in extremely high demand.

Design for the Next Generation: Poul Henningsen’s Furniture

Inspired by German Bauhaus design theories, PHbecame a pioneer of functionalism in Denmark. Poul Henningsen believed in prioritizing function over form or ”utility before beauty”, observing in 1927 that ”We do not desire a new form unless it is dictated by the objective”.

Most often he designed simple and light furniture avoiding the use of heavier materials and expressions in the design, with practicality as the main idea behind each piece. Poul Henningsen frequently observed that the solution to many common design problems in furniture were to be found in nature. Examples of this idea can be seen not only in the PH lamp, but also in the design of the Snake Chair and his collection of table designs.

It is a feature of most of the PH Furniture that the legs are uniquely designed in order to make a clear distinction between what is carrying and what is being carried. Therefore, the furniture legs are often separated visually from the frame or the frame is placed on the very edges of the legs. In addition, Poul Henningsen often made the legs underpinning his furniture thin, light and as unobtrusive as possible, in order to create the illusion that his furniture pieces appear almost to float. Poul Henningsen was also keen to revolutionize the materials used in furniture manufacture. When wood was not eschewed in favour of metal, PH felt it important to use color to allow a piece of wooden furniture to communicate. The story goes that PH painted all the wooden furniture at his private home.

PH Grand Piano launch in Copenhagen

When PH presented the very first PH Grand Piano it was a sensation at the exhibition called “Your Home”, which was held in Copenhagen in 1931. At the exhibition PH had decorated the area with some of his own quotations; “You can’t place frames with pictures on it”, “The grand piano that goes with all sorts of furniture” and “A piece of furniture can be both beautiful and ugly – an instrument is always beautiful”

The Piano as an instrument - by Poul Henningsen

Published in EPOKE, October 1931 (Danish Interior Magazine)

“Epoke has asked me to write a few words to accompany the picture of the new piano, which I designed. I would hate it if the experts were to regard this work as “functionalism”. I had no intention of following any particular fashion – which is why the only straight lines in the piano are natural ones – I simply wanted to penetrate beyond the tasteful piece of furniture to the quite tasteless instrument, which is really a reve- lation of the beauty of technical features, tradi- tion, ingenuity and craftsmanship.

Unlike so many people, I felt that the times have their own “style” in abundance. They offer some valuable things that the sensible worker can use, but most of it is fashion, the use of which one must learn to shun.

I did not change anything in the traditional piano that was already good. To begin with I did not even touch the gilding on the iron frame or the colours of the felt used for the strings. I have great respect for traditions that work well, such as those that prevail in the piano industry.

I merely set myself the task of peeling everything away that originates with non-experts and bunglers, by which I mean architects and artistcraftsmen.

The instrument must bear the stamp of the piano maker’s work, not that of some cabinetmaker who just happened to be passing. In reality, trying to turn a piano into a piece of furniture is every bit as hopeless a task as camouflaging a violin as a workbox.”

“Fancy, modern and avant-garde”

In 1932, Poul Henningsen presented a collection of eight steel tube furniture designs at the Danish Fair for Industrial Design and Products in 1932. PH’s steel tube furniture received some attention in the media because of its innovative character and more importantly because its distinctive, bold yet still elegant shapes were created in steel rather than wood. PH’s steel tube furniture did not, however, come to a point of a mass production, nor was it marketed during his lifetime. Perhaps this was due to the fact that the commercial market was not ready for what was possibly perceived as “fancy, modern and avant-garde” furniture. In the 1930s, Poul had designed furniture belonging to the future just as was the case with the completely distinctive Poul Henningsen Grand Piano, which had been presented a year earlier. Additionally, 1930s manufacturing technology was simply not advanced enough to produce on a scale the sophisticated Poul Henningsen designs, with their curvaceous forms and innovative use of materials. Even today, it is a major challenge to reproduce the steel tubes in line with his original designs, although modern manufacturing techniques now make this possible.

Now, in the 21st Century, PH’s Furniture designs are to be made available to buy for the first time, as contemporary production techniques enable them to be brought to life to accompany the highly popular PH lighting range that has become integral to the very fabric of many interiors in Denmark.