House of Finn Juhl
Finn Juhl France Chair
- Specifications
- Description
- The Designer
- The Maker
- Brand:House of Finn Juhl of Denmark
- Country: Made in Denmark
- SKU: HFJ-1360-OCOM
- Material: Oak/Walnut, Fabric/Leather
- Care:Care instructions included
- Designer:Finn Juhl
- Dimensions:(WxHxD) 31.5" x 31.8" x 28.4", Seat Height: 15"
In 1954 France & Daverkosen accounted for 60% of all Danish furniture exports and the factory employed 350 people at its peak. In 1957, the company changed its name to France & Son, when his son James France joined the company. In 1966 the company was sold to Poul Cadovius.
The France Chair, or the FJ 136 as it is also known, was designed for the American market in the late 1950s. It was originally delivered flat-packed as knock-down furniture, which was France's business idea and the main driver for his phenomenal success on the American market. Today, however, the chair is delivered fully assembled.
Though the chair originally was designed for industrial production it still has the characteristic Finn Juhl design details; The seat and back are lifted from the frame while the armrests have the iconic paper knife detail which is also found on the iconic 45 Chair.
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.