Bruno Mathsson

{{Short description|Swedish furniture designer and architect}} {{Use dmy dates|date=September 2025}} thumb|Bruno Mathsson '''Bruno Mathsson''' (13 January 1907{{spnd}}17 August 1988) was a Swedish architect and furniture designer whose ideas aligned with functionalism, modernism, as well as the Swedish crafts tradition.<ref name="Widman">{{cite book|last1=Widman|first1=Dag|last2=Winter|first2=Karin|last3=Stritzler-Levine|first3=Nina|title=Bruno Mathsson: architect and designer|date=2006|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven and London|isbn=9780300121919}}</ref>

== Biography == thumb|Bruno Mathsson in 1950 Mathsson was raised in the town of Värnamo in the Småland region of Sweden, the son of a master cabinet maker.<ref name="About">{{cite web | url = http://www.mathsson.se/en/about-bruno-mathsson-en | title = About Bruno Mathsson | publisher = Bruno Mathsson International AB | access-date = 2019-04-20 | archive-date = 2020-08-08 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200808175942/http://mathsson.se/en/about-bruno-mathsson-en | url-status = dead }}</ref> After a short time of education in school, he started to work in his father's gallery. He soon found a great interest in furniture and especially chairs, their function and design. In the 1920s and 30s, he developed a technique for building bentwood chairs with hemp webbing. The first model, called the Grasshopper, was used at Värnamo Hospital in 1931.<ref name="Bard">{{cite web | url = https://www.bgc.bard.edu/gallery/exhibitions/32/bruno-mathsson | title = Bruno Mathsson: Architect and Designer, Past Exhibition, March 22 – June 10, 2007 | publisher = Bard Graduate Center }}</ref>

Edgar Kaufmann Jr., director of the Industrial Design Department at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), collected Mathsson's chairs and included them in several exhibitions in the 1940s.<ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.moma.org/artists/3830 | title = Bruno Mathsson | publisher = Museum of Modern Art }}</ref> Kaufmann considered Mathsson's importance in furniture design on par with that of Alvar Aalto.<ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_3204_300090419.pdf | title = Modern rooms of the last fifty years | last = Kaufmann Jr. | first = Edgar | date = 1947 | publisher = Museum of Modern Art }}</ref> Kaufmann and his family also had a Mathsson chair at their house Fallingwater.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://fallingwater.org/history/preservationcollections/collection-highlights/|title = The Fallingwater Collection}}</ref>

Mathsson was also an accomplished architect; he completed about 100 structures in the 1940s and 50s.<ref name="Christiansson">{{cite journal | last = Christiansson | first = Carl E. | title = Bruno Mathsson: Furniture/Structures/Ideas | journal = Design Quarterly | volume = 65 | issue =65 | pages = 1–2, 5–31 | date = 1966 | jstor = 4047313 | doi =10.2307/4047313 }}</ref> He was the first architect in Sweden to build all-glass structures with heated floors. His furniture showroom in Värnamo (1950) was a significant example; it is well-preserved and open to the public today. For his glass houses, he developed double- and triple-pane insulated glass units called "Bruno-Pane".<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Kiss | first1 = Bernadett | last2 = Neij | first2 = Lena | title = The importance of learning when supporting emergent technologies for energy efficiency: A case study on policy intervention for learning for the development of energy efficient windows in Sweden | journal = Energy Policy | volume = 39 | issue =10 | pages = 6514–6524 | date = 2011 | doi = 10.1016/j.enpol.2011.07.053 | bibcode = 2011EnPol..39.6514K }}</ref>

He travelled extensively in the United States and was strongly influenced by the solar houses of George Fred Keck. Mathsson's architecture was also influenced by a visit to the Eames House by Charles and Ray Eames in March 1949, just as it was being completed.<ref name="Widman"/>

== Works == thumb|Mathsson's Eva and Mina chairs

=== Furniture === * Grasshopper (1931) * Mimat (1932) * Pernilla (1934) * The Eva Chair (1935) * Folding table (1935) * Paris Daybed (1937) * Swivel chair (1939-1940) * Pernilla Lounge * Jetson Chair * Super-Ellipse™ table series, with Piet Hein<ref>{{cite book|title=Design of the 20th Century|first1=Charlotte|last1=Fiell|first2=Peter|last2=Fiell|publisher=Taschen|location=Köln|edition=25th anniversary|year=2005|page=455|isbn=9783822840788|oclc=809539744}}</ref> (1966) * Annika nesting tables (1968) * The Karin chair (1969)<ref>{{cite web |title=Bruno Mathsson |url=https://www.duxiana.co.uk/en/partners/designers/bruno-mathsson |website=Duxiana |access-date=2 May 2024}}</ref> * Milton Swivel chair (1975)

===Architecture=== thumb|Bruno Mathsson furniture showroom, Värnamo (1950) [[Image:Kosta glashus, 2018d.jpg|thumb|{{Ill|Kosta glashus|lt=''Kosta Glashus''|sv}}, Kosta Glassworks (1956)]] * Bruno Mathsson furniture showroom, Värnamo (1950) * house at Danderyd (1955) * Villa Prenker, Kungsör (1955) * Kosta Glassworks exhibition hall and worker's residences ({{Ill|Kosta glashus|lt=''Kosta Glashus''|sv}}), Kosta (1956) * weekend cottage at Frösakull (1960) ** "one of the most daring examples of his glass houses."<ref name="Bard"/> * Södrakull, outside Värnamo (1965)<ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.dwell.com/article/swedish-designer-bruno-mathssons-home-is-a-perfect-midcentury-time-capsule-d3aad753 | title = Swedish Designer Bruno Mathsson's Home Is a Perfect Midcentury Time Capsule | last = Xie | first = Jenny | date = December 5, 2017 | publisher = Dwell magazine }}</ref>

== References == {{reflist}} ==External links== {{Commons}} * {{Official site}} * {{Digitaltmuseum}} * ''[https://www.bgc.bard.edu/exhibitions/exhibitions/32/bruno-mathsson Bruno Mathsson: Architect and Designer]'' 2007 exhibition at Bard Graduate Center

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mathsson, Bruno}} Category:1907 births Category:1988 deaths Category:Swedish furniture designers Category:20th-century Swedish architects Category:Recipients of the Prince Eugen Medal Category:People from Värnamo