Finn Juhl and His House

Birgit Lyngbye Pedersen was looking for the right sofa for a house from the fifties and discovered Finn Juhl (1912–1989), whose furniture is experiencing a renaissance in the wake of the retro wave. When Juhl’s house in Charlottenlund, which he designed and decorated in 1941–42, came up for sale, Pedersen purchased the building and all of its furnishings, presenting it immediately afterward to the adjacent Ordrupgaard Museum.

This monograph takes a look at Finn Juhl—alongside Hans J. Wegner and Arne Jacobsen one of the most important Danish Modernists—in an agreeably unpretentious way. Per H. Hansen, a renowned expert in Scandinavian furniture design, provides a humorous, extremely informative description of Juhl’s unconventional character and classic furniture—the Chieftain Chair, the Pelican Chair, or the Poet Sofa. Drawings, original photographs, images of the newly curated house (2008), and an amusing final chapter about his patrons round off this unusual volume.