Fritz Hansen
danish design

The history of Fritz Hansen started when cabinet-maker Fritz Hansen opened his factory in Copenhagen in 1872. Fritz and his son Christian initiated a high quality furniture production in1885 and earned a strong reputation while furnishing prestigious institutions like the University Library, the Copenhagen City Hall and the danish Supreme Court.

Early on in the century, Christian started experimenting with steam bending beech and, in the Thirties, Fritz Hansen became the world leader in the field, which later evolved into the firm’s speciality: Furniture created in laminate wood.

Thanks to collaboration with designer Kaare Klint, Fritz Hansen contributed to the development of what became worldwide famous as the scandinavian style, an adjusted variant of Germanic functionalism, with purer and lighter lines.

New collaborations started after the war, with prestigious designers like Hans Wegner (China chair, 1944) and Børge Mogensen (spoke back sofa, 1945), but it's the name of Arne Jacobsen which dominates the period. The collaboration started in 1934. The breakthrough comes with the laminated Ant chair, and few years later with the never-ending success story of the Series 7 chair. Arne Jacobsen shines even brighter with the creation of the Egg and the Swan, designed for Royal Hotel in Copenhagen, and the Series 3300. Verner Panton  also appears on the scene (Bachelor chairs), but the story of the firm stays dominated by Arne Jacobsen.

In the 1980s, Fritz Hansen purchases the minimalistic Kjærholm Collection, which Poul Kjærholm designed from 1951 to 1980, with an industrial dimension.