Waring Blender, model B, 1937; Private collection; Photo: Dallas Museum of Art.
Woot! My pots are being immortalized in a museum! Yup, I’m heading to Pittsburgh late next week for the big opening of the Carnegie Museum of Art’s new exhibit, Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk, where my Muller-Munk-designed, New Old Stock Griswold Symbol cookware will be on display. Peter Muller-Munk was one of the most important industrial designers of the 20th century, “a crucial postwar fulcrum….” Let’s take a look — a sneak peek — at the news release and photos with some of the highlights of his career. Muller-Munk’s career started in the 1920s — dig the absolutely iconic skyscraper Waring Blender, above — so Streamline design enthusiasts will enjoy this story, too.
From the Carnegie Museum of Art’s news release:
The Untold Story of a Great American Designer
Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk
Opening November 21, 2015 • Carnegie Museum of ArtCarnegie Museum of Art (CMOA) announces Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk, opening November 21, 2015, in the museum’s Heinz Galleries.
Peter Muller-Munk was a brilliant silversmith, a pioneering industrial designer and educator, and a visionary spokesperson for his profession. Silver to Steel is the first retrospective of his four-decade career.
With more than 120 works of hand-wrought silver and popular mid-century products, supported by drawings and multimedia interviews, and playfully incorporating period advertising, the exhibition presents the untold story of a man who rose from anonymity as a young silversmith at Tiffany & Co. to become a crucial postwar fulcrum, promoting the practice of industrial design across the globe via a top American design consultancy: Pittsburgh’s Peter Muller-Munk Associates (PMMA).
Photo: Tom Little for Carnegie Museum of Art.
The exhibition opens with Muller-Munk’s celebrated Modernist silver of the 1920s and 1930s. His best-known designs—the streamlined Normandie pitcher (1935) and the skyscraper-inspired Waring Blendor (1937)—reveal his transition from silversmith to industrial designer and herald an eye-opening presentation of his mass-produced objects. These highly functional and visually striking designs include Bell & Howell cameras, Westinghouse radios and appliances, Griswold cookware, Val Saint Lambert tableware, Porter-Cable power tools, Texaco gas stations and corporate identities, and prototypes in new materials for US Steel. For all its clients the PMMA firm addressed the challenges of a surging postwar consumer culture with vigor and intelligence, producing designs that pleased consumers and became highly successful in the marketplace.
Silex Air-Lift steam iron, 1949
Carnegie Museum of Art, Gift of Jewel Stern; Photo: Dallas Museum of Art.
Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk establishes Muller-Munk, and PMMA, squarely in the canon of mid-century design, and introduces a new audience to a founding father of the field. It reveals the creative side of Pittsburgh, a complement to the city’s industrial might in its manufacturing heyday. Through striking presentations of once familiar objects, the exhibition emphasizes the pervasive influence of good design on everyday life.
Silver to Steel is organized by Rachel Delphia, The Alan G. and Jane A. Lehman Curator of Decorative Arts and Design at Carnegie Museum of Art and Jewel Stern, guest curator and independent scholar. The exhibition runs November 21, 2015–March 14, 2016. The exhibition catalogue, Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk, co-authored by Delphia and Stern, will be published in November by DelMonico Books/Prestel.
Links:
- Silver to Steel: The Modern Designs of Peter Muller-Munk at the Carnegie Museum of Art
- My NOS Griswold Symbol Pots that will be in the show … and here are more photos of my pots before FedEx whisked them away
- Muller-Munk’s 1960 Westinghouse refrigerator — super rare, I don’t think they found one for the exhibit
Mark says
I was in Pittsburgh that weekend with the Art Deco Society of Washington (ADSW) on an architectural tour. We saw the Muller-Monk exhibit on Sunday, I told the guide about your pots, and that they were in response to new demand for “oven to table” attractive serving pieces.
Sorry I couldn’t get to the opening party, I try to NEVER miss MadMen theme parties, I’m sure it was a hoot though.
Hope it was fun for you.
This exhibit is highly recommended.
pam kueber says
Woot! I am working on my story about my visit right now!
ElectraChime says
Looking forward to seeing Pam’s and Pam’s Pots in Pittsburg! Say that three times fast!
jay says
Thanks for sharing the photos and links. Really neat that you could make a great addition to a museum exhibit. By the way, your older followers (me included) probably know that the Waring blender was invented by a musician.
Ed says
The local big box home improvement store has a blender quite similar to that on the shelf. Can’t remember the last time I used a blender, but seriously considering picking one up for my bar. That and one of the commercial grade Waring toasters.
tammyCA says
Hope the Carnegie gets that icebox for their exhibit..lots of cool designed items. I haven’t heard of Muller-Munk, but I have a retro Waring blendor (green)..by the famed band leader, Fred Waring, not sure if he helped design it or just financially backed it but looks like it was the first real blender that did the job.
Lisa C. says
Love the yellow refrigerator! Would look great in my 1969 ranch’s kitchen. If I lived close to Phoenix, I would have to buy it!
Dan says
I’m embarrassed to admit I had never heard of Mr Muller-Munk, but his work is every bit as exciting, innovative, and ageless as the better known industrial designers of the time, such as Russell Wright, Henry Dreyfuss, and Norman Bel-Geddes. I’m especially taken with that little coffee maker. It is a wonderful example of how even mundane utensils can be made beautiful.
What a great excuse to make a trip to Pittsburgh!
pam kueber says
Hey, I didn’t know his name either ’til I bought those pots and started researching them!
DRC says
Few remember PMM sadly; the goal of this exhibit is to resurrect his work and influence. Hope you enjoy the exhibition and the opening.
Janet in ME says
Very interesting article! On craigslist I found a similar fridge to the 1960 one featured once before, and posted it on the forum just last week. It is still available from what I can tell because it isn’t cheap at $600. It isn’t quite as fancy as the one featured but definitely has the middle drawer and similar look and it is YELLOW. Check out http://phoenix.craigslist.org/nph/app/5254506651.html
Janet in ME says
And it runs – “Works perfectly” and looks very clean! Too bad it is too late to get it in the exhibit.
pam kueber says
You rock rock rock rock rock! I let the Carnegie people know. I bet they go after it in any case! THANK YOU!
jay says
A real beauty! Back in the day it was a toss-up between GE and Westinghouse for appliance design and innovation. Both companies made everything for the house from A to Z.