Unique Modernist Wooden Floor Lamp
England, C. 1951

Description:

A sculptural wooden floor lamp, designed and made in England, Circa 1951. The maker of the tall and slender lamp is unknown and undiscoverable as the piece is a hand-made one-off piece.
Chances are, the light was made by an independent joiner/carpenter, possibly in response to their visit to the Festival of Britain.
Billed as ‘a tonic to the nation’, millions of families attended the Festival of Britain, held principally on the South Bank, London, in 1951.
The exhibition was intended to lift spirits by alerting the country to possibilities and opportunities that were previously undreamt of. ‘But the real achievement of the South Bank [according to Hugh Casson] was that it made people want things to be better, and to believe that they could be.’
Media coverage of the exhibition was extensive and mixed. The organisers (responsible for the selection of some 10,000 designs) were portrayed in the popular press as highbrow and some of the designs were ridiculed but the Contemporary Style was widely welcomed. Many people, from all sections of society, were undoubtedly directly influenced by certain exhibits. However, interviews conducted by the Geffrye Museum on how that influence was translated into people’s homes suggest that Contemporary design was still both limited and expensive. Resultantly, those able to do so went away and made their own ‘Contemporary’ objects to profess their modern lifestyles.

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