Erik Ole Jørgensen

Background

Erik Ole Jørgensen (1925-2002) was a Danish furniture architect and textile designer. Danish Wikipedia gives his birth as 27 August 1925 in Frederiksberg and his death as 23 September 2002 in Vedbæk. He trained as a furniture upholsterer and tapetserer in 1941-44, studied furniture design at the Kunsthåndværkerskolen in Copenhagen in 1945-48, and spent a couple of years as a guest student with Kaare Klint at the Academy's School of Architecture.

Signature Style

Fredericia's designer page says that, across his career as a designer and architect, he showed an instinct for tactility and an intuitive understanding of materials, in furniture as well as textile designs, and describes his work as clean, uncluttered concepts executed with expert detailing and craftsmanship. A quote on the page notes that when an upholsterer becomes a furniture designer, it influences which colours he sets beside the wood.

Notable Works

• EJ315 Sofa (1975), produced by Fredericia
• Tremmesofa series for FDB Møbler in the 1970s
• Curtain and furniture textiles for L.F. Foght, Unika-Væv, Halling-Koch Design Center and Kvadrat

Legacy

He won first prize in the Cabinetmakers' Guild autumn exhibition in 1949, 1950 and 1952, took the Award of the Year at the Earls Court furniture fair in London in 1977, and showed at the Milan Triennale in 1956, 1957 and 1958. Kvadrat's textiles he designed were used, according to Danish Wikipedia, in the Reichstag in Berlin and on the seats of the trains under the English Channel.