“The Hussar” and “the Tired Man”
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Upholstered furniture by the Danish architect Flemming Lassen has in recent years become extremely sought after on the international auction market. Especially “The Tired Man” from 1935. With a record hammer price of DKK 1.42 million, it is the most expensive design chair ever sold in Denmark. At the Cabinetmakers’ Guild Furniture Competition in 1935, Flemming Lassen designed the upholstered soft shaped easy chair named “The Hussar”. It was the starting point for “The Tired Man”, which was presented the following year at the Cabinetmakers’ Guild Exhibition. The goal was to sit and feel "as warm and snug as a polar bear cub held by its mother in the middle of the inland ice on Greenland". Early on in his career, Flemming Lassen began a partnership with his friend and colleague Arne Jacobsen. In 1939, they won first prize in the competition for the town hall in Søllerød (today Rudersdal Town Hall). Afterward, Flemming Lassen opened his own studio and later became a teacher at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts' School of Architecture. His furniture is rarely seen on the auction market, and with their soft shapes and focus on functionalism, they are situated between the international modernism and Nordic humanism. |
