Il mobile moderno

In this book, Giovanni Renzi traces the birth of "modern furniture", a term used in the early years of the 20th century to describe a new tipe of furniture, which in style and construction was disctint from the work of the nineteenth century with its classical motifs and baroque taste.
As a result of considerable research of original documents, the author has been able to document the origins of bentwood construction as it was elaborated in the workshop of Gebruder Thonet and Jacob & Josef Kohn. The various furniture items - chairs, armchairs, small tables, coat racks, living room furniture - are presented in chronological order, tracing their influences from the International Exhibition to the ideas of Koloman Moser, Josef Hoffmann, Gustav Siegel, Otto Wagner, Josef Urban, Otto Prutscher and Marcel Kammerer.
A catalogue raisonné of the production is completed by a bibliography.

Sommario

Introduction

Chapter 1
Modern bentwood furniture in the new century

Chapter 2
From Paris to the First World War: catalogue

Bibliography

Photo credits