Piano bench 1902
Henry van de Velde BE
Fritz Scheidemantel DE
lacquered pine
purchase via Meurrens, 1977
We don’t know who Henry van de Velde designed this piano bench for. This copy was used by his wife Maria Sèthe, first in their apartment in the Cranachstrasse in Weimar and then in Hohe Pappeln, the residence for his family in the same town. The bench was initially white and had a cushion. It was first shown at an exhibition in Düsseldorf in 1902. At least one other copy was made for the music room at Museum Folkwang in Hagen, now called the Osthaus Museum Hagen. Van de Velde was commissioned to design the interior of this building by Karl Ernst Osthaus, the patron of the arts who opened his museum in that same year. Van de Velde himself often made use of furniture which he designed for commissioners. In this case we don’t know as yet who was first.
SOURCES
Met dank aan Antje Neumann -Golle (Klassik Stiftung Weimar) en Werner Adriaenssens (Jubelparkmuseum).