Product Description
Nigel Coates, Rare, Early and Iconic “Genie” stool 1988

NIGEL COATES (b. 1949) England
BRANSON COATES ARCHITECTURE London
“Genie” stool 1988
Carved and sandblasted solid ash seat on twisted mild steel legs
Marks: NIGEL COATES GENIE STOOL
Illustrated: 1000 chairs, Charlotte & Peter Fiell (Cologne: Taschen Verlag, 1997), p. 615.
H: 26: x D: 13 1/2″
Price: $9,500
British architect and designer. He studied at Nottingham University and the Architectural Association, London, where he graduated in 1974 and subsequently taught until 1989. In 1983 he formed the group NATO (Narrative Architecture Today) with a group of former students and began to practice independently; two years later he went into partnership with Doug Branson (b 1951). Coates became known for his fluid and lively graphic style and the overt theatricality of his designs. His proposals for the redevelopment of London, involving sophisticated allegories of popular culture, were shown in two exhibitions: ArkAlbion (1984), with drawings of new development areas such as County Hall and the Isle of Dogs, and Ecstacity (1992), with computer simulations and video clips. In the renovation (1980) of his own flat in London he juxtaposed the original, ornate late 19th-century interior with ‘found’ furniture and decorative objects. The publication of this project brought Coates to the attention of Japanese clients who were seeking fashionable Western designers, and he carried out several projects in Japan that became increasingly theatrical: in Tokyo the Metropole Restaurant (1985) evokes a European café, while the Parco Café Bongo (1986) juxtaposes classical English furniture with an imitation aeroplane wing mounted on the ceiling; and the Arca di Noè (1988), Sapporo, is an eclectic mixture of classical motifs and a concrete boat. Coates’s radical approach was dissipated in later British works, such as a series of London shops: one for Katharine Hamnett in Sloane Street (1988) has a shop front formed of aquaria, and one for Jigsaw in Knightsbridge (1992) has its shop front formed of a two-storey copper column in the shape of a phallus. In 1992 he began designing an extension to the Geffrye Museum, London.
Coates was an influential teacher at the Architectural Association from 78- 86, and has lectured extensively abroad. In 1995 he was appointed Professor of Architectural Design at the Royal College of Art and now divides his time equally between the college and his office. Nigel Coates furniture is represented in the Modern Furniture Collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London.
“I go for architecture that overlays and enhances. By blending observation and wit with reason, I want my work to generate a sense of the unexpected, and the seemingly spontaneous.”
Nigel Coates, Rare, Early and Iconic “Genie” stool 1988
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LOUIS C. TIFFANY (1848-1933) USA
TIFFANY STUDIOS New York
Kettle-on-Stand c.1902
Silver on copper with carved teak wood handles and finial in an organic-form and hexagonal shaped kettle-on-stand with burner
Marks: Tiffany Studios, New York (on all three pieces)
Illustrated: The Art of Louis Comfort Tiffany, Donald L. Stover (The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, 1981), p. 88, illus. 189 (description on p. 96); Tiffany at Auction, Alastair Duncan (New York: Rizzoli International Publications, 1981) p. 50, pl. 137.
A rare example of a subtle organic-form and hexagonal shaped kettle-on-stand emulating pooling water in a Japanese influenced design by Louis Comfort Tiffany and made by Tiffany Studios
H: 10 1/2″ x D: 8″ x W: 9″
ALBERTO MARCONETTI Milan, Italy (active Argentina)
Armchairs (Two available) c. 1960’s
Oak, painted iron, leather strapwork and seat
Marks: by Alberto Marconetti (script signature)
H: 40 1/2” x W: 27” x D: 21”
Seat height: 19″
Price: $7,450 (each)
This pair of armchairs nods to the influence of such Italian designers as Carlo Bugatti and Carlo Mollino yet are their own unique creation. They have an unusual anthropomorphic quality in that the frame suggests a skeletal structure. In addition, the leather strapwork, iron loops and hooks allude to the equipage of the ancient Roman equestrian order.
ITALIAN DESIGN / POP ART
“Oversized “anywhere” lamp circa 1960’s-1970’s.
Real blown glass bulb with a yellow metal “protector” paying homage to the classic “anywhere” work light. It is interesting to note that at a later date Ingo Maurer who designed the famous “flying bulb lights” used this light as an inspiration and did a paired down simple version utilizing plastic rather than glass for the actual glass bulb part.
H: 19″ X W: 11 1/2″
Price: $2,450
SCHOOL OF MACKINTOSH (1868-1928) UK
Box with hinged cover c. 1900
Silver plate with a large abstract heart design and stylized Glasgow rose motifs in bas-relief.
Illustrated: Modern Silver throughout the world, 1880-1967, Graham Hughes (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1967), p. 145.
H: 2″ x W: 6 1/4″ x D: 4 3/4″
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