Erik Ole Jørgensen
ARCHITECT & DESIGNER

BIOGRAPHY

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Jørgensen, Erik Ole, furniture designer, textile designer

Born 27.8.1925 at Frederiksberg, died 23.9.2002

 

Education

Lower secondary school exam 1941

Upholsterer apprentice 1941–44 

Business school 1941–44 

Technical school, the Danish School of Arts and Crafts’ carpenter line 1945–48 (cabinetmaker)

Visiting student with Professor Kaare Klint at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts’ School of Architecture 1946–48.

 

Distinctions

Honorary mention at The Technical Society’s prize competition 1945

Silver medal at The Technical Society’s prize competition 1946 (deck chair)

Prize awarded 28 March 1948 by the Shool of Arts and Crafts’ society

First prize in the Carpenter Guild’s competitions 1949 (with Folke Pålsson) and 1952
First prize in the Carpenter Guild’s competitions 1950
First prize in the Upholsterer Guild’s competition 1953

Honorary diploma in the 10th Triennale 1956, the 11th Triennale 1957 and the 12th Triennale 1958 in Milan

Award of the Year 1977 at the international British furniture fair at Earls Court, London

Bella Center’s spatial award 1980, 1982, 1986 and 1994 for the design of Kvadrat’s stand. 

 

Design practice, furniture production

Own practice 1952-2000. Furniture manufacturer 1952–72 (Georg Jørgensen & Søn), furniture manufacturer (A.P.-Stolen).
 

Jobs and assignments

Teacher at Tehnical School 1946–52. External examinator at Kolding Shool of Arts and Crafts during the 1980s

Head of Artistic Development at the textile manufacturer L.F. Foght 1953–64

Free-lance adviser and designer at Dux 1958–64

Free-lance adviser and designer at Tabergs Yllefabrik 1964–68

Free-lance adviser and designer at Tekstil Lassen 1964–68

Free-lance adviser and designer at Unika-Væv, Halling-Koch Design Center and Kvadrat 1968–2000

Furniture designer for Georg Jørgensen & Søn and for A.P.-Stolen 1952–72. Head of Product Development in Salesco 1970–72 

Furniture designer for the Carpenter Guild’s annual exhibitions 1947–58 
Furniture designer for Erik Jørgensen Møbelfabrik, Svendborg, 1970s
Furniture designer for AS Coordina 

Designed furniture collection for FDB Møbler, later NAE, Kvist from 1950 

Furniture designer for X-Col from 1979

Exhibition architect for the furniture coalition BRA BOHAG with trade-fair and exhibition concepts

Exhibition architect with trade-fair and exhibition concepts for Kvadrat 1971–2000. 

 

Exhibitions

The Carpenter Guild’s Fall Exhibition 1947, 1948, 1949, 1951, 1952 and 1953 

Triennale 1956, 1957, 1958 in Milan

Furniture fairs in Fredericia and Bella Center and abroad, from the 1960s through 2000

The international British furniture fair at Earls Court, London

Museum of Decorative Arts, Copenhagen 1986

 

Works

Deck chair (1946, silver medal at The Technical Society’s prize competition 1945); The Carpenter Guild’s furniture exhibitions 1947: Erik Ole Jørgensen and Folke Pålsson: prize-winning living room in oak and mahogany; Erik Ole Jørgensen and Folke Pålsson: living room in palisander and mahogany; 1948: Erik Ole Jørgensen and Folke Pålsson: bedroom in ash and mahogany; 1949: Erik Ole Jørgensen and Folke Pålsson: living room in cherry wood and teak; 1951: dining room furniture with dining nook in fumed oak and mahogany; 1952: living room; 1953: timber merchant Eeg’s parlour; oval chair with footstool (1953, first prize in the Upholsterer Guild’s competition); oval chair B 361 made from steel tubes and leather/skiver and produced by master upholsterer Olaf Black in collaboration with Bovirke (1955); furniture collection GJ1-29 from own factory and DUX (1960s); chairs for theatre at Trinity University, Texas (1964–66); furniture produced by Erik Jørgensen Møbelfabrik (including the sofa Klassikeren EJ315 from 1974); furniture designed for FDB Møbler (Tarm-, Stole- og Møbelfabrik/NAE): including the spindle-back sofas J148 and J149 and armchairs J146 and J147, folding chair J138; 1970s); series Fortuna, Neptun and Fulton with sofa, armchair and low table, 1980s, armchair and spindle-back chair for BOLI, 1986; together with Hans Olsen: nursing home furniture, 1975, produced by Schou Andersens Møbelfabrik. 

 

Textiles for L.F. Foght 1952-64, furniture fabrics, curtain series, rugs
 

Textiles for Kvadrat from 1971, furniture fabrics and curtain series

Designs include Erik, Ole, Flamegate, Firegate, Newgate, Plaza, Island, Island Point, Island Tern, Beta, Gamma, Cardinal, Molly, Nestor, Cane, Basta, Multi, Plura, Air, Oval, Solo, Duo, Quattro, Cardinal, Neptun, Tirane, Tropical, Malone, Komma, Punktum, ‘Time og Time 2000’ curtain fabric (1987); ‘Trim’ curtain fabric (1987); ‘Granit’ furniture fabric (1992); ‘Tivoli’ curtain fabric (1996); ‘Tundra’ furniture fabric (1997); ‘Flora’ furniture fabric (1997), ‘Frame’ curtain fabric (1999). 
 

Exhibitions and showrooms

For Kvadrat 1971–2000 in Denmark and abroad, including their anniversary exhibition at the Danish of Decorative Arts (1986)

Kvadrat’s anniversary exhibition at Illums Bolighus department store (1986)
 

Biographical details

Erik Ole Jørgensen came from a family of craftsmen with a keen interest in art; his father was a furniture upholsterer and his grandfather, Hans Peder Jørgensen, was a wood carver who did major tasks for I. P. Mørck, the most distinguished master joiner at the time. Hans Peder Jørgensen was responsible for the chairs in the meeting hall at the Danish Parliament, chairs for Copenhagen City Hall, the altarpiece in Hermon Church, Nyborg (destroyed by fire 1943) and a sculpture at Løgumkloster Abbey.

 

Having completed his apprenticeship as a furniture upholsterer, Erik Ole Jørgensen went on to

educate himself at the Technical Society’s School, the School of Arts and Crafts – studying under Børge Mogensen and Hans J. Wegner, among others – and as visiting student with Professor Kaare Klint at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts’ School of Architecture. Between 1947 and 1953, he contributed furniture designs to the Danish Carpenter Guild’s annual fall exhibition, winning first prize on several occasions.

 

Though the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, Erik Ole Jørgensen became known for a string of simple, functional furniture designs that cemented his position as one of the best furnituremakers of his generation.

 

In 1952, he took over his father’s upholsterer company (continuing under the name Georg Jørgensen & Søn until the 1980s), enabling him to produce many of his own designs. The theatre at Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas, had 800 chairs designed and produced in 1965. For a while, between 1970 and 1972, the companied merged with A.P.-Stolen. 

From the 1970s on, Erik Ole Jørgensen collaborated primarily with two major Danish furniture companies, FDB Møbler and Erik Jørgensen Møbelfabrik, where his designs achieved status as true classics.
 

After Erik Ole Jørgensen had won first prize in the Upholsterer Guild’s furniture competition, he realised that there were no fabrics on the market that matched his vision. He then ended up designing the textiles for his furniture himself and had them produced. This marked the start of a long, illustrious career as a designer and consultant for the textile industry. With inspiration from the material itself, profound insight in weaving techniques and a keen sense of colour, he created an astounding variety of textiles, and colourways on others, his efforts always characterised by a certain virtuosity and aesthetic sensibility.

 

Erik Ole Jørgensen designed textiles for L.F. Foght, where he was Head of Artistic Development for a period, for Halling-Koch Design Center and for the textile company Kvadrat.

He worked with Kvadrat from 1971 and right up until his death, both as organiser of the company’s presentations and showrooms in Denmark or abroad and as designer of numerous curtain and furniture fabrics. The textiles he designed for Kvadrat were used, among other places, in the German Reichstag in Berlin and on train seats in the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.

Among the exhibitions he designed for Kvadrat were the anniversary exhibitions at the Museum of Decorative Arts and the department store Illums Bolighus, 1986, as well as the annual exhibitions at Bella Center and at various furniture dealers.

 

Erik Ole Jørgensen also did a number of interior design projects, conversions and extensions, including re-decoration of hotel rooms and hallways at Brøndums Hotel and Admiralgården, Skagen, 1985.

Between 1985 and 1990, he managed the renovation and adaptation of the old custom house in Ebeltoft when converted into the glass museum, an assignment that included design of furniture as part of the museum extension. He aso designed the presentation of HM Queen Margrethe II’s sketches and designs at the museum in Ebeltoft. 

 

Adaptations/extensions and exhibition architect for Leif Madsen/Texmads AB, Bollebygd, Sweden from 1974 through the 1990s.

Architect on the renovation of Dyveke Pharmacy 1991, with textile designer Kirsten Helene Kamedula as well as design of the shop KK in Hellerup 1992.