The collection
Semi-reclined lounge chair with seat, back, and arms made of rope wrapped around a chromed and black metal frame with four legs.
1950

Lounge Chair, Flag Halyard

Designed by
Hans Wegner (1914–2007)
Material
Chromium-plated and painted steel, halyard, wood, cotton
Produced by
Getama, Gedsled, Denmark
Dimensions
80.5 x 105 x 116.2 cm

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Liliane and David M. Stewart Collection, D97.173.1

Wegner was one of the most famous Danish designers at midcentury. Apprenticed to a cabinetmaker at the age of fourteen, he went on to earn a degree in architecture in 1938. He then worked as a furniture designer for the Danish architect Arne Jacobsen before setting up his own practice in 1943.

Wegner’s modern chair forms, usually inspired by Chinese furniture and other cultural sources, were made with beautiful wood with distinctive grains. Flag Halyard was an exception, as a strongly geometric design of steel and rope inspired by a 1928 chaise longue by French modernist Charlotte Perriand. Halyard, seen on the seat and back, is the rope used to raise and lower a flag.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, photo: Denis Farley.