Russel Wright
Encyclopedia
Russel Wright was an American Industrial designer during the 20th century. Beginning in the late 1920s through the 1960s, Russel Wright created a succession of artistically distinctive and commercially successful items that helped bring modern design to the general public.
Wright's legacy continues today as his company Russel Wright Studios remains an active industrial design licensing firm. With offices in Garrison, New York
and Burbank, California
, Russel Wright Studios continues to work with corporate and public clients in the licensing and manufacturing of his designs and products.
, the most widely sold American ceramic dinnerware in history, manufactured between 1939 and 1959 by Steubenville Pottery in Steubenville, Ohio
. He also designed top selling wooden furniture, spun aluminum dining accessories and textiles. His simple, practical style was influential in persuading ordinary Americans to embrace Modernism
in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. Wright's trademarked signature was the first to be identified with lifestyle-marketed products, paving the way for personality-driven lifestyle empires such as Martha Stewart
, Ralph Lauren
and others.
Wright designed several popular lines of Melmac melamine resin
plastic dinnerware for the home and did early research on plastic Melmac dinnerware for restaurant use. Wright's first Melmac line of plastic dinnerware for the home, called "Residential" was manufactured by Northern Plastic Company of Boston, MA beginning in 1953. "Residential" received the Museum of Modern Art
Good Design Award in 1953. Also "Residential" was one of the most popular Melmac lines with gross sales of over $4 million in 1957. The line remained popular for many years continuing in production by Home Decorators, Inc. of Newark, NY. Wright introduced his Melmac dinnerware line called "Flair" in 1959. One of the patterns of "Flair", called "Ming Lace" has the actual leaves of the Chinese jade orchid tree tinted and embedded inside the translucent plastic. As with his ceramic dinnerware, Wright began designing his Melmac only in solid colors, but by the end of the 1950s created several patterns ornamented with decoration, usually depicting plant forms.
American Modern "blonde" wooden furniture was produced by the Conant-Ball company of Gardner, Massachusetts
between 1935 and 1939, and bore the branded mark "American Modern Built by Conant-Ball Co. Designed by Russel Wright".
at the Art Academy of Cincinnati
while still in high school. While following his family's tradition of studying for a legal career at Princeton University
, he was a member of the Princeton Triangle Club
and won several Tiffany & Co.
prizes for outstanding World War I
memorial sculptures. This, along with the urging of his academic adviser at Princeton, confirmed his conviction gained in the year before college while a student at the Art Students League of New York
under Kenneth Hayes Miller
and Boardman Robinson
, that his future was in the field of art.
Wright left Princeton for the New York City
theater world and quickly became a set designer for Norman Bel Geddes
. This early association with the theater lead to further work with George Cukor
, Lee Simonson
, Robert Edmond Jones
, and Rouben Mamoulian
. His theater career came to an end when George Cukor closed his Rochester, New York
stock company at the end of 1927. Upon returning to New York City, he started his own design firm making theatrical props and small decorative cast metal objects.
Although firmly rooted in the Midwest, he spent the entirety of his professional artistic career in New York, employing such early instrumental modern design practitioners and artists as Petra Cabot
, Henry P. Glass
and Hector Leonardi in his growing industrial design firm.
, and his father and grandfather were local judges.
Wright married Mary Small Einstein, a designer, sculptor and businesswoman, in 1927, after a short yet care free summer together in Woodstock, New York
, where Russel was involved in the New York artist's Maverick Festival and artist colony. Mary studied sculpture under Alexander Archipenko
. Together Mary and Russel went on to form Wright Accessories, a home accessories design business and began creating small objects for the home consisting of cast metal animals and informal serving accessories of spun aluminum and other materials. The couple also wrote the best-selling Guide to Easier Living in 1950 that described how to reduce housework and increase leisure time through efficient design and management.
Wright’s only child, Annie, was only two years old when Mary died in 1952, necessitating Wright's raising their adopted daughter as a single parent. Annie Wright continues to manage her father’s designs and products through Russel Wright Studios.
in Garrison, New York
, building an eco-sensitive Modernist
home and studio called Dragon Rock surrounded by extensive woodland gardens. It is on the National Register of Historic Places
and a U.S. Department of Interior designated National Historic Landmark
. Manitoga is open to the public, operated by the non-profit Russel Wright Design Center, with tours and hiking trails.
Designer
Russel Wright’s method of design came from the belief that the table was the center of the home. Designing in layers from there outwards, he designed tableware to larger furniture, architecture to landscaping, all according to his concept of easy, informal living. It was through his immensely popular and widely distributed housewares and furnishings that he revolutionized the way Americans lived and organized their homes in the mid 20th century.Wright's legacy continues today as his company Russel Wright Studios remains an active industrial design licensing firm. With offices in Garrison, New York
Garrison, New York
Garrison is a hamlet in Putnam County, New York, United States. It is part of the town of Philipstown and is on the east side of the Hudson River, across from the United States Military Academy at West Point...
and Burbank, California
Burbank, California
Burbank is a city in Los Angeles County in Southern California, United States, north of downtown Los Angeles. The estimated population in 2010 was 103,340....
, Russel Wright Studios continues to work with corporate and public clients in the licensing and manufacturing of his designs and products.
Dinnerware
Wright is best known for his colorful American ModernAmerican Modern
American Modern was a distinct American design aesthetic formed in the period between 1925 and World War II. American Modern was created by a pioneering group of designers, architects and artists, among them were Norman Bel Geddes, Donald Deskey, Henry Dreyfuss, Paul Frankl, William Lescaze,...
, the most widely sold American ceramic dinnerware in history, manufactured between 1939 and 1959 by Steubenville Pottery in Steubenville, Ohio
Steubenville, Ohio
Steubenville is a city located along the Ohio River in Jefferson County, Ohio on the Ohio-West Virginia border in the United States. It is the political county seat of Jefferson County. It is also a principal city of the Weirton–Steubenville, WV-OH Metropolitan Statistical Area...
. He also designed top selling wooden furniture, spun aluminum dining accessories and textiles. His simple, practical style was influential in persuading ordinary Americans to embrace Modernism
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. Wright's trademarked signature was the first to be identified with lifestyle-marketed products, paving the way for personality-driven lifestyle empires such as Martha Stewart
Martha Stewart
Martha Stewart is an American business magnate, author, magazine publisher, and television personality. As founder of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, she has gained success through a variety of business ventures, encompassing publishing, broadcasting, and merchandising...
, Ralph Lauren
Ralph Lauren
Ralph Lauren is an American fashion designer and business executive; best known for his Polo Ralph Lauren clothing brand.-Early life:...
and others.
Wright designed several popular lines of Melmac melamine resin
Melamine resin
Melamine resin or melamine formaldehyde is a hard, thermosetting plastic material made from melamine and formaldehyde by polymerization. In its butylated form, it is dissolved in n-butanol and xylene. It is then used to cross-link with alkyd, epoxy, acrylic and polyester resins, used in surface...
plastic dinnerware for the home and did early research on plastic Melmac dinnerware for restaurant use. Wright's first Melmac line of plastic dinnerware for the home, called "Residential" was manufactured by Northern Plastic Company of Boston, MA beginning in 1953. "Residential" received the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
Good Design Award in 1953. Also "Residential" was one of the most popular Melmac lines with gross sales of over $4 million in 1957. The line remained popular for many years continuing in production by Home Decorators, Inc. of Newark, NY. Wright introduced his Melmac dinnerware line called "Flair" in 1959. One of the patterns of "Flair", called "Ming Lace" has the actual leaves of the Chinese jade orchid tree tinted and embedded inside the translucent plastic. As with his ceramic dinnerware, Wright began designing his Melmac only in solid colors, but by the end of the 1950s created several patterns ornamented with decoration, usually depicting plant forms.
Furniture
Wright designed a succession of popular furniture lines for many furniture companies beginning in the early 1930s through the 1950s. His most popular line of essentially Art DecoArt Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
American Modern "blonde" wooden furniture was produced by the Conant-Ball company of Gardner, Massachusetts
Gardner, Massachusetts
Gardner, Massachusetts is a city in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 20,228 as of the 2010 census. Gardner is home to Dunn State Park, Gardner Heritage State Park, Lake Wampanoag Wildlife Sanctuary, and Mount Wachusett Community College.-History:Named in honor of...
between 1935 and 1939, and bore the branded mark "American Modern Built by Conant-Ball Co. Designed by Russel Wright".
Career
Russel's early art training was under Frank DuveneckFrank Duveneck
Frank Duveneck was an American figure and portrait painter.-Youth:Duveneck was born in Covington, Kentucky, the son of German immigrant Bernard Decker. Decker died when Frank was only a year old and his widow remarried Joseph Duveneck...
at the Art Academy of Cincinnati
Art Academy of Cincinnati
The Art Academy of Cincinnati is a private college of art and design, accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design, in Cincinnati, Ohio...
while still in high school. While following his family's tradition of studying for a legal career at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, he was a member of the Princeton Triangle Club
Princeton Triangle Club
The Princeton Triangle Club is a theater troupe at Princeton University. Founded in 1891, it is the oldest touring collegiate musical-comedy troupe in the United States, and the only co-ed collegiate troupe that takes an original student-written musical on a national tour every year...
and won several Tiffany & Co.
Tiffany & Co.
Tiffany & Co. is an American jewelry and silverware company. As part of its branding, the company is strongly associated with its Tiffany Blue , which is a registered trademark.- History :...
prizes for outstanding World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
memorial sculptures. This, along with the urging of his academic adviser at Princeton, confirmed his conviction gained in the year before college while a student at the Art Students League of New York
Art Students League of New York
The Art Students League of New York is an art school located on West 57th Street in New York City. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists, and has maintained for over 130 years a tradition of offering reasonably priced classes on a...
under Kenneth Hayes Miller
Kenneth Hayes Miller
Kenneth Hayes Miller was an American painter and teacher.Born in Oneida, New York, he studied at the Art Students League of New York with Kenyon Cox, Henry Siddons Mowbray and with William Merritt Chase at the New York School of Art. He died in New York City.-Students:Miller taught at the Art...
and Boardman Robinson
Boardman Robinson
Boardman Robinson was a Canadian-American artist, illustrator and cartoonist.-Early years:Boardman Robinson was born September 6, 1876 in Nova Scotia, Canada. He spent his childhood in England and Canada, before coming to Boston in the first half of the 1890s...
, that his future was in the field of art.
Wright left Princeton for the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
theater world and quickly became a set designer for Norman Bel Geddes
Norman Bel Geddes
Norman Melancton Bel Geddes was an American theatrical and industrial designer who focused on aerodynamics....
. This early association with the theater lead to further work with George Cukor
George Cukor
George Dewey Cukor was an American film director. He mainly concentrated on comedies and literary adaptations. His career flourished at RKO and later MGM, where he directed What Price Hollywood? , A Bill of Divorcement , Dinner at Eight , Little Women , David Copperfield , Romeo and Juliet and...
, Lee Simonson
Lee Simonson
Lee Simonson was an American architect painter, stage setting designer.He acted as a stage set designer for the Washington Square Players , when it became the "Theatre Guild" in 1919, also he became a stage setting staff of the theater.- Literary works :*“Skyscrapers for Art Museums” The American...
, Robert Edmond Jones
Robert Edmond Jones
Robert Edmond Jones was an American scenic, lighting, and costume designer. He is credited with incorporating the new stagecraft into the American drama. His designs sought to integrate the scenic elements into the storytelling instead of having them stand separate and indifferent from the play’s...
, and Rouben Mamoulian
Rouben Mamoulian
Rouben Mamoulian was an Armenian-American film and theatre director.-Biography:Born in Tbilisi, Georgia to an Armenian family, Rouben relocated to England and started directing plays in London in 1922...
. His theater career came to an end when George Cukor closed his Rochester, New York
Rochester, New York
Rochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and more recently as The Flower City...
stock company at the end of 1927. Upon returning to New York City, he started his own design firm making theatrical props and small decorative cast metal objects.
Although firmly rooted in the Midwest, he spent the entirety of his professional artistic career in New York, employing such early instrumental modern design practitioners and artists as Petra Cabot
Petra Cabot
Petra Cabot was an American designer and artist, perhaps best known for the 1950s plaid Skotch Kooler.Cabot was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on February 21, 1907...
, Henry P. Glass
Henry P. Glass
Henry P. Glass was an American designer, architect, author, and inventor.-Biography:Born on 24 September 1911 in Vienna, Glass was trained as an architect at the Technical University of Vienna from 1929 to 1936. He married Eleanore Christine Knopp in March, 1937...
and Hector Leonardi in his growing industrial design firm.
Personal life
Russel Wright was born into an historic old American family, Wright's mother had direct lineage with two signers of the Declaration of IndependenceDeclaration of independence
A declaration of independence is an assertion of the independence of an aspiring state or states. Such places are usually declared from part or all of the territory of another nation or failed nation, or are breakaway territories from within the larger state...
, and his father and grandfather were local judges.
Woodstock, New York
Woodstock is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States. The population was 5,884 at the 2010 census, down from 6,241 at the 2000 census.The Town of Woodstock is in the northern part of the county...
, where Russel was involved in the New York artist's Maverick Festival and artist colony. Mary studied sculpture under Alexander Archipenko
Alexander Archipenko
Alexander Porfyrovych Archipenko was a Ukrainian avant-garde artist, sculptor, and graphic artist.-Biography:...
. Together Mary and Russel went on to form Wright Accessories, a home accessories design business and began creating small objects for the home consisting of cast metal animals and informal serving accessories of spun aluminum and other materials. The couple also wrote the best-selling Guide to Easier Living in 1950 that described how to reduce housework and increase leisure time through efficient design and management.
Wright’s only child, Annie, was only two years old when Mary died in 1952, necessitating Wright's raising their adopted daughter as a single parent. Annie Wright continues to manage her father’s designs and products through Russel Wright Studios.
Manitoga
After his wife’s death, Russel Wright retired to his 75 acres (303,514.5 m²) estate, ManitogaManitoga (Russel Wright Home)
Manitoga was the estate and home of industrial designer Russel Wright. It is located along NY 9D south of Garrison, New York, USA, a short distance north of the Bear Mountain Bridge.-History:...
in Garrison, New York
Garrison, New York
Garrison is a hamlet in Putnam County, New York, United States. It is part of the town of Philipstown and is on the east side of the Hudson River, across from the United States Military Academy at West Point...
, building an eco-sensitive Modernist
Modern architecture
Modern architecture is generally characterized by simplification of form and creation of ornament from the structure and theme of the building. It is a term applied to an overarching movement, with its exact definition and scope varying widely...
home and studio called Dragon Rock surrounded by extensive woodland gardens. It is on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
and a U.S. Department of Interior designated National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
. Manitoga is open to the public, operated by the non-profit Russel Wright Design Center, with tours and hiking trails.
External links
- Official Russel Wright Studios LLC website
- The Russel Wright Design Center - Russel Wright Biography
- The Russel Wright Design Center: Manitoga - Gardens and Dragon Rock
- Russel Wright American Modern and Iroquois Casual color charts
- Russel Wright at IDSA
- The Maverick Festival - early personalities
- Melmac Central Complete Russel Wright Melmac Dinnerware History