Marcel Breuer, the Wassily Chair and the ‘Frozen’ Bauhaus Modernism After 1945

Abstract

Abstract Marcel Breuer was the first Bauhaus designer—and one of only a few—who was actively involved in reissuing his furniture designs. When Dino Gavina began working with Breuer to reissue his first tubular steel chair in November 1962, calling it ‘Wassily’, it was almost forty years old. In fact, the Wassily chair was not the first attempt to reissue the first tubular steel armchair of 1926. In 1960, Wohnbedarf in Zürich produced a limited edition, but sold only three pieces. Two years later, the first Wassily chair appeared at Gavina’s showroom in Milan, thus securing it a ‘career’ as a timeless piece of design furniture. This contrasted with Breuer’s earlier, unsuccessful attempts to launch and produce his designs during the 1940s and 1950s. This article investigates these first attempts, as well as the making of reissues and the reasons for their success. It also investigates several contradictions in the ‘Wassily’ reissue, beginning with the paradox that, in order to be recognized and succeed commercially, Bauhaus objects had to resemble those of the past and their designers were not asked to create up-to-date pieces of furniture.