House of Finn Juhl
Finn Juhl Reading Chair
- Specifications
- Description
- The Designer
- The Maker
- Brand:House of Finn Juhl of Denmark
- Country: Made in Denmark
- SKU: HFJ-5311-BOV-FJ
- Material: Oak/Walnut, Fabric/Leather
- Care:Care instructions included
- Designer:Finn Juhl
- Dimensions:
- (WxHxD) 20.4" x 29.1" x 22.8"
- Upholstered Seat Height: 17.9"
- Veneer Seat Height: 16.9"
The Reading chair is one of Finn Juhl's more simple, yet elegant, pieces. The chair is characterized by intricate details and a quirky story. The chair was designed in 1953 and allows for multiple sitting positions—a unique design function which is typical for Finn Juhl's furniture. Earlier on, the Reading Chair has only been available with an upholstered seat, but it has now been relaunched with a veneered seat—as seen on the very first version, which Finn Juhl designed for the company Bovirke.
Juhl was trained as an all-round building architect, not—as he emphasized—especially as a furniture designer. On several occasions, he pointed out that as a furniture designer, he was purely self-taught.
His early chairs were produced in small batches, eighty at most, because they were created for Guild shows where the work of the artisan was emphasized over the burgeoning industry of mass production. However, they were almost all reissued later in his career.
In 1951 he designed the Trusteeship Council Chamber in the United Nations Headquarters in New York as a gift from Denmark to the UN.
A stability of construction harmonized with a unique expression of form distinguishes his works. His fondness for teak as a material led him to develop new and superior techniques for its use, and he is responsible for the present popularity of teak in Danish furniture.
Finn Juhl had a great influence on the following generation of Scandinavian architects with his use of bold sculptural forms and ultra-refined detailing. Juhl once said: "One cannot create happiness with beautiful objects, but one can ruin quite a lot of happiness with bad ones."
By the time of his passing in 1989, Finn Juhl had become an award winning and highly appreciated furniture designer on the international design stage. To this day, Finn Juhl's sculptural pieces of furniture are celebrated worldwide and he is credited as one of the founding fathers of the Danish Modern movement in America.