Important Design 
13 December 2012
Important Design 
284

Hans Luckhardt

prototype ST 14 chair

Gebrüder Thonet
Germany / Austria, 1932
chrome-plated steel, stained ash plywood 34½ h × 21 w × 23 d in (88 × 53 × 58 cm)
estimate: $15,000–20,000
result: $17,500
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This example is a working prototype of the chair. Signed with applied metal manufacturer's label to underside: [Thonet]. This chair has been authenticated by the Bauhaus Archiv in Berlin and Thonet Germany.
provenance: Wright, Modernist 20th Century, 7 December 2003, Lot 215 | Private collection
literature: 100 Masterpieces from the Vitra Design Museum, von Vegesack, ppg. 108-109 Deutsche Stahlrohrmobel, von Vegesak, ppg. 47, 49 and cover Bent Wood and Metal Furniture 1850-1946, Ostergard, pg. 294, fig. 85 Les Années 30, Bony, pg. 876

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Cantilevered Form

Hans Luckhardt's ST 14

The poetic form of Hans Luckhardt's ST 14 transcends the cantilever principle set forth a few years earlier by Breuer, Mies van der Rohe and Stam. Rigid geometries are replaced with fluid streamlining and a seemingly weightless seat. This example retains an early metal Thonet plaque, a label used until 1935 when it was replaced by a tube steel logo. The design was initially developed for production by Desta in 1931 but Anton Lorenz sold Desta to Thonet in 1932. Thonet attempted to redesign the structure to give it a cleaner line and to make the design more feasible for mass production, thus the struts differ from Desta’s model. Ultimately, Thonet never put this chair into production.
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