Jean Prouvé * Furniture designer and architect

ARTISTS & CREATORS MID CENTURY FURNITURE

Jean Prouvé french Industrial and Furniture Designer and Architect. Jean Prouvé is one of the most influential furniture designers of the early modern design movement, Jean Prouvé introduced the machine age and industrial engineered modern design aesthetic to interiors in the steel, aluminum and architecture he created. He then continued her experiments with different materials.

Jean Prouvé was both engineer and modern designer.

In the first thirty years of his career in the Atelier Prouvé in Nancy, which he had founded in 1924 after having been trained as a metal smith and engineer, he worked on countless design solutions for everything from wood and sheet metal furniture to experimental buildings for schools, hospitals and offices. He also designed prefabricated refugee houses and holiday homes. His flat-packed tropical houses from this era – the Maison Tropicale – have become one of the most desired treasures of today’s high-bidding vintage architecture collectors.

Jean Prouvé always regarded himself as more of an engineer and constructor instead of a modern designer. He never designed for the sake of form alone, concentrating instead on the essence of materials, connections and production. Jean Prouvé strove for the most constructionally and materially efficient designs, with such classic end results as the modern design Standard chair of 1934 and the Antony chair of 1954. Utilizing his innovative method of folding sheet metal, Jean Prouvé designed a series of tables that have the perceived lightness of bridges and the presence of architecture. In the mid 1950s, Jean Prouvé was forced to abandon modern design furniture production and began devoting his time to the challenges of prefabricated architecture. His own house, which he designed as a prototype, is now considered a major development in prefab housing.

Even though Jean Prouvé has long been an influential force among modern designers, especially constructionally minded architects such as Norman Foster and Renzo Piano, and his vintage modern design has been sought after for years by connoisseurs and museums who specialize in modern design, his work has remained relatively unknown to the general design public.