Wegner, Hans Jorgen

▪ 2008

      Danish furniture designer

born April 2, 1914 , Tønder, Jutland, Den.

died Jan. 26, 2007, Copenhagen, Den.

designed sculpturally elegant yet functional chairs, each of which epitomized the beauty and superb craftsmanship of the Danish Modern style. Wegner created his first chair in 1931 while serving as an apprentice cabinetmaker. He designed (1940–42) furniture for the architects Arne Jacobsen and Erik Møller before opening his own office in 1943. Wegner's cane-seated “Round Chair,” or simply “the Chair” (1949), was declared “the world's most beautiful chair” by the American magazine Interiors in 1950 and was famously used in the 1960 U.S. presidential debates. Other significant chairs included the Y-backed “Wishbone” (1949), a hangable folding chair (1949), the steel-and-leather “Ox” (1960), and a curved, three-legged stacking chair (1988). Wegner's pieces were exhibited in design collections at the Copenhagen Museum of Art and Industry (from 1942), New York City's Museum of Modern Art, and some two dozen other museums.

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