Mid Century Modern Furniture Makers Marks

More than half a century after the 1951 Festival of Britain, post-war British pattern is in fashion once more. The small-scale, functional, lightweight forms of the Fifties and Sixties wait as contemporary today as they did at the height of Modernism, and the classic brands are back.

Manufactured with the intention of existence affordable every bit well every bit cute, there are still plenty of vintage pieces to buy at reasonable prices. For under £500, you lot can option up designs by great British makers such as Yard-Programme, Ercol, Stag, Hille and Archie Shine, which are non only timelessly stylish, merely as well highly collectable.

west elm Mid-Century Media Con sole (203 cm) - Acorn 1599

ERCOL

In 1920, Florentine-built-in designer Lucian Ercolani established Ercol in Loftier Wycombe, the Buckinghamshire town that had been the heart of the British article of furniture industry during the 19th century. Ercolani based his range on classic designs, but lightened the heavy traditional forms with pale timbers and slender tapered legs.

Ercol was renowned for its innovative techniques, too as the tiptop-notch quality of its solid beech and elm products, and perfected the fine art of steam-bending wood into graceful curves. The firm was also renowned for 'taming' elm, which had a tendency to warp, devising a method of kiln-drying the timber with steam. Though pricier than some of its mass-market competitors, who used veneers rather than solid timber, Ercol's designs have the same minor lines and unostentatious experience that distinguishes the best mail-war design.

Ercol exhibited at the 'Britain Tin Brand It' exhibition at the V&A, in 1946, and at the Festival of Britain in 1951. The business firm's almost familiar pieces are the 'Butterfly' and 'Stacking' chairs, 'Plank' dining table, 'Love Seat' bench and 'Trio', a nest of three pocket-sized pebble-shaped tables.

Vintage examples are currently being restored and sold past designer Margaret Howell, in collaboration with Ercol. If y'all're buying vintage, the 1958 'Butterfly' chair is the design to get for, a comfy dining chair, with elm seat and back, and beech legs (vintage version costs around £250; the reissued model from ercol.com costs £395).

MERROW Associates

Pieces past Merrow Assembly are the next big thing in vintage piece of furniture, and prices are soaring: in 2007, a Merrow rosewood dining table with chromed steel legs sold at Christie's for over £5,000, when several years before it would have realised merely £1,000. Non as famous a brand as K-Plan or Ercol, this small-scale Surrey business firm is notwithstanding presently the decorator's favourite vintage label.

Founded by designer Richard Young (who studied under Danish designer Ole Wanscher) and
engineers Percy Wyatt and Peter Weeks in 1965, the firm turned out highly finished sideboards, cabinets and tables that sold in stores such as Harrods and Heal's. Their favoured materials – rosewood, steel and drinking glass – made for luxurious, glossy finishes, and furniture was produced in minor batches of 50 pieces.

Vera da Silva of Da Silva Interiors, London says the quality is unequalled: 'Even the screws are chromed, and they fit perfectly – they are just lovely pieces of technology.' Merrow's iconic 1970s coffee table has a rosewood base with solid chrome and glass elevation: examples cost £1,800-£2,000 at Da Silva. Orange & Brown stocks a circular Merrow dining tabular array, in rosewood, at £1,150.

ARCHIE Shine

In the early 1960s, Robert Heritage was responsible for designing the teak and rosewood home furnishings that the East London business firm Archie Shine sold mainly through Heal'south. (Subsequently, in 1968, Heritage would go famous for the GR 69 range of article of furniture for Gordon Russell and an iconic chair for the QE2.) Archie Smooth'due south high quality effects were aimed at the affluent eye classes, and, in fashion, struck a class between the stark, minimalist wait of the early 1950s, and the heavy masculine chrome and drinking glass style of the late 1960s.
Designs were low key only warm, with obviously silhouettes and subtle details, such equally copper plume inlay panels or decorative grooves on drawers.

The Archie Smooth pieces that attract collectors' eyes nowadays are the simple tables and consoles. Nonetheless relatively inexpensive for the quality they offer, Archie Shine furnishings are tipped to rising in value once the brand is better known. Orange & Brown has a solid rosewood oval dining table (£1,777) with six rosewood chairs (£1,777).

Lee Russell, co-proprietor, says: 'The set is hard to find because although information technology was commercially produced, the quantities were express. Archie Smooth is an example of British article of furniture that is only as good in quality and design as the Scandinavian pieces of the period. It's only a matter of fourth dimension before prices rise.'

G-PLAN

Eastward Gomme, founded in High Wycombe in 1898, had been making traditional furniture for over half a century when, in 1953, it launched Thousand-Programme and revolutionised the fashion mail-war Britons furnished their homes. Donald Gomme, head of design until 1958, created a range of furniture for the whole house. A carte of 'interchangeable' pieces allowed householders to carmine-pick the furnishings they fancied, while the consequent style gave a coordinated wait to their home.

In another groundbreaking move, routine now but revolutionary then, showrooms displayed the furniture in room settings. The brand quickly became a condition symbol, and the G-Plan crimson swing ticket and gold-embossed stamp became marks of skillful taste. Chiliad-Plan's first offering was the Brandon range, introduced in 1953. By the mid-1950s, a more luxurious style was in demand and Gomme produced furnishings in darker woods with black legs and Oriental-inspired shapes.

When Donald Gomme left the firm in 1958, its fortunes waned. The company then hired Ib Kofod Larsen, a Danish designer. Larsen╒s teak range, G-Programme Danish, a commercial hit that was produced well into the 1970s, is highly sought-after by G-Plan enthusiasts. Since it sold so well and was produced in volume, it is relatively inexpensive still. A M-Plan Danish chest of drawers costs around £450 from Orange & Brown.

HILLE/ROBIN Solar day

Hille was a British article of furniture manufacturer, founded in 1906, that had specialised in heavy, traditional article of furniture only, post-war, wanted to modernise its output. Hiring Robin Day as designer in 1949 was a masterstroke that led to a stream of simple, affordable but technically innovative tables, chairs, desks and storage units. Designs to await out for are his 1950 'Hillestak Stacking' chair, the 1952 'Reclining' chair and the 1953 'Qstak'.

The Hille/Robin Day partnership was prolific – a total of over 150 designs in 44 years – and marked past the evolution of depression price and high volume furnishings, some of which, for instance the 1963 'Polyprop Stacking' chair, accept never been out of production. Though Twenty-four hour period approached his task as applied trouble solving, his pared-down solutions were besides beautiful and inspired many other designers, such equally Donald Gomme.

Pippa Kahn of Fears & Kahn has a Robin 24-hour interval sofa and bench (designed in 1959), covered in 'Causeway' fabric designed by his wife, Lucienne Day, for Heal's in 1967. The rare 'Form Group' ensemble was manufactured in the late Sixties and has a teak frame, black veneered wood seat back and black metal legs and costs £2,600. 'Information technology's very interesting to find something that combines the talents of the hubby and wife squad. It's really a collector's piece,' says Pippa.

STAG

Past the time post-war rationing ended in 1952, buyers were eager for new and stylish furnishings, and manufacturers were looking for designers with the talent to create inspiring products. Architects Sylvia and John Reid were employed past The Stag Cabinet Company of Nottingham during the 1950s and 1960s to design the business firm'southward modern, machine-made, mass-market ranges of bedchamber and dining room piece of furniture.

Despite being produced in volume, Stag'south veneered wood sideboards and sofas, tables and chests were of robust quality as well as existence affordable to younger buyers, who appreciated their innovative manner. Best-loved by fans of Fifties furniture today is the 'C' range, a stark, functional bedroom suite, featuring simple box-shaped units with recessed handles in light oak or darker walnut. Launched in 1953, the 'C' range was a commercial hit at the fourth dimension, and highly influential for other designers.

Mark Parrish, a dealer in 20th-century design, says that he has noticed Stag condign more pop with his clients recently. 'There'south a real interest in John and Sylvia Reid as a design couple. People are after the simplest bedchamber furniture in oak or walnut – the 'C' range turns up quite regularly and, after a bit of restoration, information technology looks swell.' Parrish sells 'C' range chests of drawers, made in the 1950s and 1960s, at around £300 in oak and about £380 in walnut.

Another 21st-century favourite is the Reids' teak dining suite, launched in 1960 as the 'Southward' range. The low sideboard, set on satin polished steel legs, and the oval dining tabular array are highly sought-after, as fantabulous examples of Stag'south spare, utilitarian, but timeless, way. These were relatively luxurious pieces, considerably pricier than the 'C' range, and fewer tin can be found today. An 'S' range sideboard, with original legs and handles, costs £800-£1,500, from Mark Parrish.

Notice OUT MORE

Buy

Alfies Antique Marketplace 020 7723 6066

C20C 07779 759319

Da Silva Interiors 07958 519157

Fears and Kahn 0115 981 8501

Margaret Howell 020 7009 9006

Marker Parrish 07957 300848

Orange & Brown 07968 218029

Sarah Potter 020 7627 0570

Twentytwentyone 020 7837 1900

View

Frederick Parker Collection of Chairs 020 7320 1827

The Five&A Museum 020 7942 2000

Geffrye Museum 020 7739 9893

Read

Austerity to Affluence: British Art and Design 1945-1962 by Annamarie Stapleton, Richard Chamberlain, Geoffrey Rayner, et al (Merrell Publishers Ltd)

The G-Program Revolution: A Celebration of British Popular Furniture of the 1950s and 1960s past Basil Hyman and Steven Braggs (Booth-Clibborn Editions)

retrowow.co.uk is an online resource near post-war design
merrowassociates.com and ercol.com for information most the firms