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Richard Neutra is regarded as one of the trailblazers of California Modernism.
Photo © Klaus Meier-Ude/VS
California/Main
Feb 28, 2016

Even if Richard Neutra saw it very differently, he was and still is routinely pigeonholed as a proponent of the “International Style”. Yet he once noted in 1965: “My buildings don’t really belong to the ‘international style’; no-one can find precisely the hole that my work actually fits into.” And he is right if we look at his furniture designs, which simply refuse to be fitted into one single category. For instance, he devised some of his truly iconic designs for “Lovell Health House” in Los Angeles in 1929: the armchair and sofa “Alpha Seating” with their angular wooden frame and “Lovell Easy Chair” with lots of leather and tubular steel elements. Neutra registered his “Cantilever Chair” with the patent office in 1936. Finally he masterminded not only a house for his acquaintance, TV and radio star John Nesbitt, but also the “Boomerang Chair”.

Neutra also left his mark in Mörfelden-Walldorf just outide Frankfurt/Main: In 1960, he designed an entire estate there consisting of 42 one and two-story detached and semi-detached houses. And one year later “Haus Rang” in Königstein im Taunus was completed. Now Neutra has returned to the city on the Main, with the furniture collection that manufacturer VS Möbel has been reproducing since 2012 in close collaboration with Dion Neutra, Richard Neutra’s son.

California/Main – Furniture by Richard Neutra
from January 28 to March 26, 2016
Juwelier Biegel
Börsenplatz 13-15 60313 Frankfurt/Main

Invitation only:
After-work cocktails on March 3, 2016, 6 p.m., with a short lecture by
Dr. Thomas Müller, managing director of VS Möbel: “Richard Neutra: Vom Haus zum Möbel”

MORE on Stylepark:

Following in the footsteps of Richard Neutra
(13 September 2014)

“Haus Rang” in Königstein at Taunus. Photo © Klaus Meier-Ude/VS
Its curving sides and tensioned belts have turned the “Boomerang Chair” from the 1940s into a design icon. Photo © VS
The design of the “Cantilever Chair” deviates from its classic predecessors of the 1930s. The seat is separate from the backrest.
Photo © VS
The “Low Organic Table” combines soft lines and organic shapes. Photo © VS
The “Lovel Easy Chair” is now being produced by manufacturer VS. Photo © VS
Another version of „Cantilever Chair“: Plywood with oak veneer combined with natural nappa leather. Photo © VS