Wormley Dunbar: Edward J Wormley. 1905-1997. Design Director of Dunbar Furniture

This is the only book available on American furniture designer Edward J Wormley whose work sits at the crossroads of industrial design and tradition. Wormley lived in New York and worked for the furniture company Dunbar based in Berne, Indiana starting in the 1930s. His furniture was a symbol of the growing prosperity of middle class America and its desire for a new, modern way of living. Dunbar is far better known than Wormley thanks to its ground-breaking advertising campaigns that conjure up the world of “Mad Men”. The archival images give an insight into the mid-century American Dream when health, wealth and happiness were the birthright of every US citizen. Wormley’s furniture was selected for several of the Good Design exhibitions at MoMa organised by Edgar Kaufmann jr, the driving force behind Frank Lloyd Wright’s house Fallingwater in Pennsylvania. The book highlights the distribution and manufacture of Wormley’s work in Europe by the Belgian designer Jules Wabbes and notably the furnishing of the American Embassy in The Hague designed by Marcel Breuer. A reference book for collectors of vintage furniture, it includes many previously unpublished drawings, original photographs and images from Dunbar catalogues. 120 pages, 99 black and white illustrations, 19 colour illustrations. Bibliography. Index.