Amoeba Table 5005
NO GA
Launch
17/12/2024
NO GA launch three tables by legendary modernist Paul T. Frankl
Paul T. Frankl (1886–1958) designed a series of sofa tables for the Michigan-based Johnson Furniture Company in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The low, biomorphic-shaped tables were sold as “cocktail tables,” a modernized version of the conventional coffee table. Now three of them - Amoeba, Big foot and Plectrum - are being launched by NO GA in close collaboration with the Paul T. Frankl Estate.
Frankl’s postwar furnishings for the furniture brand Johnson were a departure from everything he had been doing up to that time. His previous works, before the war, had been handcrafted and sold exclusively through his gallery. His clientele counted many of the Hollywood stars of the era, including Fred Astaire, Charlie Chaplin, Claudette Colbert, Cary Grant, and Katherine Hepburn. He also designed the homes of directors Alfred Hitchcock, John Huston, and King Vidor. The various furniture series he made for Johnson were different: they were produced in larger numbers and sold through furniture stores around the country.
The biomorphic forms of Frankl’s “cocktail tables” were likely inspired by the works of Alvar Aalto, Kaare Klint, and others in Scandinavia. But Frankl added his own touches, including the cloud form, cork sheets for the tops, and canting the legs outward, which not only gave the tables greater stability but broke from conventional right-angled geometry.
Born in Vienna and trained in Vienna and Berlin, Frankl lived for three years in the New York during World War I. He moved permanently to the United States in 1921 where he first had a shop on Park Avenue and, later, on East 48thStreet and Madison Avenue. In 1934, he transferred his Frankl Galleries to Los Angeles, opening a sales outlet on Wilshire Boulevard.
His breakthrough came in the 1920s with his “Skyscraper” bookcases—towering, stair-stepped pieces that mimicked New York’s soaring buildings. Up until now, his much appreciated tables for Johnson Furniture Company have only been available through auction houses.
Amoeba Table, Bigfoot Table och Plectrum produceras av Nordiska Galleriet.
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