The Wiener Werkstätte Catalog

stablished in Vienna, Austria in 1903, the Wiener Werkstätte, or Vienna Workshops, emerged during the height of the Vienna Secession. Its founders were architect Josef Hoffmann, painter Koloman Moser, and the wealthy entrepreneur and patron Fritz Waerndorfer. In 1907, they took over distribution for the Wiener Keramik, which introduced ceramic maker Berthold Löffler onto the scene. The Wiener Werkstätte rejected the aesthetics of the then-en vogue flowery and extravagant Art Nouveau movement. Instead, Werkstätte artists sought to strip away those overly decorative details and abstract their designs in a way that still exuded the basic elements of elegance and luxury. Those eloquent combinations of professional simplicity and gorgeous ornamentation took many forms, including woodworking, graphic design, and textiles produced by the Workshops.

Opposite Page: Josef Hoffmann, Palais Stoclet, Brussels Great Hall, 1905–1911 End Papers: Josef Hoffmann, Vineta Fabric Design, 1904

WOOdWOrking

Artists of varying skill sets from many disciplines comprised the Wiener Werkstätte and this openness to artistic expression of any kind is what set the group apart. As Josef Hoffmann described the artists of the Werkstätte, “They are not slaves of a machine but creators and shapers, makers of form and masters.” As someone with an extensive background in architecture, Hoffmann himself was well-versed in both the worlds of interior and furniture design and was able to seamlessly translate graphic simplifications into a three-dimensional medium. For example, his Sitzmaschine (1904) chair has references of nature motifs with its arms adorned with wooden nubs reminiscent of small mushrooms. It is a subject that Hoffmann drew inspiration from for other works during his time with the Wiener Werkstätte.

While the majority of Koloman Moser’s work includes paintings and graphic design, he also produced much furniture and other types of woodworking during his time with the Wiener Werkstätte. The complexity of his furniture designs varied from piece to piece, as seen in the difference of both shape and detail between the Zuckerkandl (1904) armchair and a standard Sewing Box (1904). The armchair is designed with a sectioned grid in mind, which appears along both vertical and horizontal borders and avoids crossing lines. The ovular shapes in the wood are not wholly organic either. The sewing box, on the other hand, puts practicality and function over decoration and frivolous detail. The box is composed of alternating wood colors, taking on an almost checkerboard-like pattern. While it is devoid of any imagery that harkens back to nature, it still upholds the basic principles of manipulating lines and shapes.

Koloman Moser, Zuckerkandl, 1904

Koloman Moser, Sewing Box, 1904

Josef Hoffmann, Sitzmaschine, 1904

– Josef Hoffmann, describing the workers of the Werkstätte

Graphic Design

The graphic design produced by the Wiener Werkstätte followed the same rules previously established: the abstraction of nature with an emphasis on manipulating inorganic shapes. However, since most of the graphics produced by this department were for posters, organic shapes were not as heavily looked down upon and, in fact, complemented the geometric layouts. While not as popular commodities as the woodworking and furniture making areas of the Workshops, graphic design was still an important part of the further development of all the different sectors, as they applied the concepts in their purest forms—one that could be converted to various other mediums—and acted as the primary mode for the shift from Art Nouveau.

Designs for posters often relied on the use of swirls, something not as widely seen in woodworking and textiles. The curling of the strokes followed one of two options: close and thick—imitating a circle, or thin and

wide—reminiscent of the Fibonacci spiral. Berthold Löffler’s poster for Kabarett Fledermaus (1908) displays this with the sans-serif type he uses incorporating the swirls into the letters themselves. This contrasts Carl Otto Czeschka’s cover of Program I, Kabarett Fledermaus (1907), as it incorporates the swirling patterns into the background of the image instead. The style that Löffler adopts for the faces he depicts on his posters are a staple of the Workshops, as he also uses it in works not associated with the Kabarett Fledermaus, as seen in his poster for Kunstschau Wien 1908 (1908).

Berthold Löffer, Kunstschau Wien 1908, 1908

Berthold Löffer, Kabarett Fledermaus, 1908

Carl Otto Czeschka, Program I, Kabarett Fledermaus, 1907

Otto Prutscher, Chantilly, 1905

Otto Prutscher, Chantilly (color), 1905

Josef Hoffmann, Mushrooms, 1903

Gustav Klimt, Portrait of Friederike Maria Beer, 1916

Gustav Klimt, Portrait of Friederike Maria Beer (detail), 1916

Textiles

Having officially become a category under the Wiener Werkstätte at the same time as the fashion sector, fabric design and textile production became yet another essential part of how the Workshops cultivated their brand and image. Utilizing the same approach to design as their furniture and woodworks, there was a greater emphasis on portraying the essence of nature in a way that did not focus itself on the small details, but instead, on the rejection of realistic depictions to deliver the same amount of information without sacrificing the quality of the imagery.

Otto Prutscher’s Chantilly (1905) fabric pattern is typical of textiles produced by the Wiener Werkstätte. Aside from the teardrop shape, all other silhouettes are geometric and the line weight remains consistent throughout the piece. Josef Hoffmann’s fabric Mushrooms (1903) is able to maintain the integrity of the common fungus without having to painstakingly render each detail by hand. The half circles used to convey the general shape of the mushrooms reveal just enough information for someone to be able to tell what it is. The fashion designers at the Wiener Werkstätte were also able to produce their own memorable articles of clothing using these patterns. One example is the Afternoon Dress (1906 – 1908) designed by Dagobert Peche and Eduard Josef Wimmer-Wisgrill. The garment was a favorite of Friederike Maria Beer, a devoted patron of the Workshops, and she was immortalized in Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Friederike Maria Beer (1916), wearing the same dress.

Dagobert Peche and Eduard Josef Wimmer-Wisgrill, Afternoon Dress, 1906 – 1908

legacy

The Wiener Werkstätte filed for bankruptcy in 1932, due in large part to the Great Depression caused by the stock market crash of 1929. The designs produced during its lifetime were impactful enough in the world of art for echoes to still exist in the modern era. In the 2007 Scholastic edition of C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, a frame that borders the map of Narnia at the beginning

of the book resembles Bertolf Löffler’s design for the Wiener Keramik Logo (1910). The thick, black border is broken by a multitude of angled lines in a way that seems nonsensical and may serve no true meaning. However, when compared, one can see the similarities shared between the two. It is clear to see the lines imitate each other and where the influence is nearuncanny, even with the difference in the shape housing the changing diagonal, horizontal, and vertical strokes.

Additionally, in 2018, the fashion brand Zara revived an old print from the Wiener Werkstätte. One of the men’s button-ups sold used the same patterns from L.H. Jungnickel’s Urwald (1910 – 11), which depicts a tropical jungle. While it is uncertain whether the colors remained unchanged between iterations, it is clear to see that the patterns are identical. There has also been an attempt to bring back the Wiener Werkstätte itself, as opposed to just its designs. The Neue Wiener Werkstätte, also based in Vienna, Austria, seeks to revive the movement in a more direct manner and modernize the style for the 21st century. The online store has a wide array of products that primarily cover the furniture side of the Workshops. Even with only a small catalog to browse through, it is evident to see how the ideas of the Wiener Werkstätte have been translated, especially in their interior designs. Thus, it is clear that the Vienna Workshops are still alive and well today and continue to inspire.

C.S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, 2007

Berthold Löffler, Wiener Keramik Logo, 1910

L.H. Jungnickel, Urwald, 1910 – 11

Zara, Jungle Print Shirt, 2018

Neue Wiener Werkstätte, Interior Fitting 5, 2016