Fondly known as ‘the grand dame of Danish design’, Nanna Ditzel’s lasting impact on our modern interiors is one of postmodernist rebellion. This year, we celebrate a century since the designer’s birth and explore how Ditzel’s daring designs continue to set the tone
According to Nanna Ditzel, you should only strive to become a designer if you can’t avoid it. “And she couldn’t,” says Dennie Ditzel, the Danish designer’s daughter and the current CEO of Nanna Ditzel Design studio. For Ditzel senior, who passed away in 2005 at the age of 81, the lines between work and play were blurred; her every waking moment was consumed with creativity, always planning the next artistic venture. “Nanna loved being creative, and she was a very ambitious and hardworking designer,” Dennie recalls.
Celebrating the centennial of Nanna’s birth this year, the Nanna Ditzel Design studio is pulling out all the stops. In addition to the launch of a never-before-produced limited edition lounge chair they’re also dipping into new colourways. Most notably, they’re helping to put on the most extensive exhibition of Ditzel ever staged at Trapholt Museum dubbed ‘Nanna Ditzel – Taking Design to New Heights’.
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The Trinidad Chair - 1992. During the 1970s, Nanna travelled frequently to Trinidad and Tobago, where she was fascinated by the architectural leaf-sawed details on many of the colonial-era buildings. “The cutouts on the Trinidad chair were inspired by these,” says Dennie. Technological advancement was the only way for Nanna to realise her intricate design, which could only be produced in 1992 when the three-axis CNC milling machine came to Denmark. ‘Trinidad’ wood chair, €430. Nanna Ditzel. Photo: Andrea Papini
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The Toadstool - 1962. The children’s toadstool Trissen came about at the request of a colleague. Designed in 1962 for a kindergarten, Nanna was set on not making miniature versions of furniture for grown-ups. “She said: ‘Children never sit still for long. They move, move the furniture, want to turn them round and maybe stand on them,’” Dennie recalls. The children’s toadstool ‘Trissen’, €425. Nanna Ditzel. Photo: Andrea Papini
Nanna's story begins in Copenhagen in 1923, where her zeal for design took root during her early childhood. This relentless passion propelled her into the craft of cabinetmaking, then into the hallowed halls of the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, where she met her creative partner and future husband, Jørgen Ditzel. Together they emerged as the shining new duo of Danish design, skillfully carving wooden furniture with pared-down aesthetics in their shared studio and mastering minimalist jewellery in collaboration with renowned silver-smith Georg Jensen. The latter landed them the coveted Lunning Prize in 1956, a prestigious award some would describe as the Nobel Prize of design.
Jørgen's untimely death at 40 brought the couple's creative collaboration to an abrupt end. Undoubtedly devastated, yet undaunted, Nanna relocated to London where she reinvented herself as a solo designer. Here, she met and married German cabinetmaker and entrepreneur Kurt Heide. The duo opened the furniture store Interspace shortly before returning to Copenhagen in 1985.
She has been a role model for later female designers in the way that she has proved it to be possible for a woman to succeed in the very difficult design world
Dennie Ditzel
The store, a revolutionary hub for contemporary furniture, marked a new era in Nanna’s design evolution, bringing modernist, almost futuristic elements into her style. Not to mention colour. Arguably, Nanna was a pioneer of pantones on a par with Verner Pantone himself. In the 1960s, Nanna’s innovative use of colour and unique style left an indelible mark on the design world. Take the company Kvadrat, for instance. Founded in 1968, it became part of the Danish design zeitgeist with Nanna’s 'Hallingdal’ upholstery: a two-tone, wool and viscose fabric, which daringly weaved zingy pink with green and red with yellow.
Nanna's designs were, without question, ahead of their time. Though grounded in mid-century sensibilities, she transcended tradition, experimenting with shapes, materials, and colours. Introducing, in Dennie’s words, “soft, poetical and sculptural designs in bright colours,” she allowed no limitations on her creativity – everything was possible. “She very often challenged the producers in what was thought possible, and her philosophy was that three steps forward and two steps backwards is still one step forward,” says Dennie.
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‘Trinidad’ wood chair, €430. Nanna Ditzel. Photo: Andrea Papini
The Hanging Egg Chair - 1959. Ditzel designed the instantly recognisable Hanging Egg chair together with her husband Jørgen Ditzel in 1959. Suspended in the air, the cocooning shape is constructed to make you feel as if you’re sitting in a room within the room. Their daughter Dennie Ditzel believes its origins were a “continuation and consequence” of her parents’ three-dimensional experiments with space at the time. ‘The Hanging egg chair’ in rattan and art fibre, €2,874. Nanna Ditzel. Photo: Andrea Papini
Despite Nanna's presence in a male-dominated industry – among her contemporaries were Arne Jacobsen and Hans J Wegner – the designer was unfazed, never speaking of gender. “She did not compare herself to her male colleagues, and she was not a part of the female emancipation movement,” says Dennie. “But she has been a role model for later female designers in the way that she has proved it to be possible for a woman to succeed in the very difficult design world.”
Nanna may not have thought of herself in terms of gendered emancipation, but her career was laced with liberation. Throughout her six-decade tenure as the grand dame of Danish design, Ditzel applied her unbridled philosophy across the board, adopting a punk attitude which led her to become a bonafide icon. A postmodern master whose legacy reverberates to this day.