Vladimir Kagan

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Vladimir Kagan (born August 29, 1927 in Worms , † April 7, 2016 in Palm Beach , Florida ) was a designer of furniture based in New York City .

Life

Vladimir Kagan's parents were Illi Kagan and Hilde Wallach. His father was a Russian soldier in German captivity during World War I and was interned in a camp in Pfiffligheim until 1918. In Worms, Illi Kagan met Hilde Wallach from Munich and married her in 1926. They ran a shop on Worms Obermarkt. Together with their two children Tanya and Vladimir, they fled to the United States in 1938 .

In his youth, Vladimir Kagan was mainly engaged in painting and sculpture . He began studying architecture at Columbia University in New York , but in 1944 he joined his father Illi Kagan's company, who owned a joinery. So he learned how to build furniture.

In 1947 he opened his first store on 65th Street in New York. In 1950, together with Hugo Dreyfuss, he founded the company Kagan - Dreyfuss , based on 57th Street in New York. After Dreyfuss left, he moved his showroom to East End Avenue. In 1970 he relocated the production of his furniture to Long Island City and relocated his showroom to the hip 59th Street in Manhattan. In 1988, Kagan retired. Nevertheless, from 1990 to 1992 he took over the presidency of the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) in New York.

Vladimir Kagan was married to Erica Wilson . They had three children together and commuted between their apartments in New York and Nantucket . In April 2016, Kagan died of a heart attack in Florida at the age of 88.

Act

Vladimir Kagan: stool (ca.1960)

His furniture is exhibited in the most renowned museums in the world, including in Germany the Vitra Design Museum and the Neue Sammlung . Private collectors of his designs include Barbara Jacobson from the Museum of Modern Art , director David Lynch , actor Dan Aykroyd , Andy Warhol and Frank Sinatra . Some well-known fashion designers such as Tom Ford , Donna Karan and Giorgio Armani also collect pieces by Vladimir Kagan. In 2004 his autobiography was published .

In 1947 and 1948 he designed the Cocktail Lounges for the first UN headquarters in Lake Success . In Freiburg im Breisgau, Kagan furnished a restaurant and a club lounge named after him on the top floors of the station tower at a height of 68 meters.

He has lectured at New York's Parsons School of Design on the history of architecture and furniture design, as well as at Yale University (2010) and Philadelphia University (2014). In 2001 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in art and design from the Kendall College of Art and Design and in 2009 an honorary doctorate from the New York School of Interior design .

Design awards (selection)

  • 2000 from ASID for his life's work
  • 2002 from the Brooklyn Museum for Lifetime Achievement
  • 2004 nominated for the National Design Award and the Environmental Design Award
  • 2009 Interior Design Hall of Fame Award

literature

  • Vladimir Kagan (with a foreword by Tom Ford): The Complete Kagan. Pointed Leaf Press, New York 2004, ISBN 097276612X .
  • Jörg Koch: Vladimir Kagan , in: Worms 2015, Heimatjahrbuch für die Stadt Worms, Worms 2014, pp. 276–282, ISBN 978-3-944380-20-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Legendary Furniture Designer Vladimir Kagan Dead at 88 , architecturaldigest.com, April 8, 2016, accessed April 10, 2016
  2. ↑ Vladimir Kagan is dead. "In loving memory", August 29, 1927 - April 7, 2016 , Wormser Zeitung of April 9, 2016
  3. ↑ Biography on vladimirkagan.com , accessed on April 10, 2016 (English)
  4. ^ Béatrice De Rochebouet: Décès de Vladimir Kagan, le roi du sofa. In: lefigaro.fr. Le Figaro , April 7, 2016, accessed April 8, 2016 (French).
personal data
SURNAME Kagan, Vladimir
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American furniture designer of German origin
DATE OF BIRTH August 29, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH Worms , German Empire
DATE OF DEATH April 7, 2016
Place of death Palm Beach , Florida