Dominic Bradbury’s Mid-Century Modern Furniture Is a Perfect Companion to Modernism Week

As we see each February — every year for the past two decades or so in Palm Springs — the appetite for midcentury modern architecture and design grows evermore insatiable. Collectors and enthusiasts crowd into the Modernism Show at the Palm Springs Convention Center and file in, booties over their shoes, any number of midcentury modern homes for a look at classic designs and rare, hard-to-find pieces.

To prepare for such an encounter, or navigate one on the fly, what you need is a copy of writer, journalist, lecturer, and architecture and design consultant Dominic Bradbury’s comprehensive and richly illustrated Mid-Century Modern Furniture, new from Thames & Hudson.

“The midcentury period was the golden age of furniture design,” Bradbury explains in his introduction in the book. “It was a time like no other, when innovation combined with creativity to produce an extraordinary range of furniture with both depth and breadth.”

 The 448-page volume digs into the inventive and exciting period between the mid-1940s and early 1970s — one of the most productive eras for objects and furniture in the home, driven by postwar optimism, innovation in materials and technology, and new modes of living. 

The book showcases a generation of design — everything from armchairs, sofas, and tables to cabinets, bookcases, and nightstands — “built upon the work of the pioneer modernists of the 1920s and 1930s, including Marcel Breuer, Mies van der Rohe, Charlotte Perriand, Eileen Gray, and others.” 

“As a result of the enduring popularity of the period, many pieces featured [here and] in the book are still in production and have been reissued. At the same time, the midcentury movement has become a valued source of reference and inspiration for contemporary designers.”

Here’s a sampling of the treasures to be found inside.