Table lamp, Germany 1926

Base in ground glass. Stem in tubular glass with chrome-plated rod inside. Shade in milky-white glass blown on a wooden mould. Maximum recommended bulb is 60W. Made in Italy.

This is a variation of the Table lamp 1924, utilizing ground glass with tubular glass stem and milky white glass blown shade. The lamp’s working parts are visible; the opaque glass shade, a type formerly used only for industrial lighting, helps to diffuse the light. Through the employment of simple geometric shapes—circular base, cylindrical shaft, and conical shade—Wagenfeld achieved “both maximum simplicity and, in terms of time and materials, greatest economy.”

Wilhelm Wagenfeld

Wilhelm Wagenfeld, born in Bremen in 1900, studied at the Kunstgewerbeschule and after he started his apprenditiceship as a silveremith. In 1923 he was a student at the metal work laboratory of the Bauhaus, ran by Moholy-Nagy, Wagenfeld become assistent in 1926 and teacher in 1929. In the ensuing years he began to work in industry: the Jenaer Glaswerke, the Vereinigte Lausitze Glaswerke, and the Rosenthal porcelain factory. After the war, Wagenfeld moved to Berlin where he taught industrial design, first at the Leibruitz Academy and then at the Fine Arts School. Wagenfeld, well known a "the modern craftsman", managed to fit in with the industrial system. Not surprisingly, his name is closely linked to Bauhaus in Weimar, an astonishing incubator of pioneering experimentation and applied arts.