Vintage View: The affordable work of Eileen Gray

IRISH women designers are often promoted for their essential qualities of firstly, being Irish and secondly, for being women.

Even now this is done before the content and importance of their work is even considered. Let’s face it, some of the great female creatives now curated in museums across the world, were patted politely on the head, or treated with open contempt by men and some culpable women.

In 1938, designer Eileen Gray suffered an act of ‘naked phallocracy’ by Le Corbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris) and if you want to know more about that fabulous term, unrecognised by any spell-check, and the convoluted relationship of Gray and Charlie, explore the feature articles online by Rowan Moore on Eileen Gray’s house, E-1027.

Le Corbusier, not satisfied with the fragile beauty Gray imparted to her iconic building and former home, took a weekend break at E-1027, slapping up some sensual murals on the interior walls while performing the entire statement completely nude. A lesser woman than Anglo-Irish aristocrat Kathleen Eileen Moray Smith, might have taken him over the towering cliff face of Rocquebrun-cap-Martin with a firm blow from her E-1027 chromed tea-table.

Like just about every creative woman at that time, from Georgia O’Keeffe to Billy Holiday, Gray was surrounded by men with early 20th century attitudes towards the artistic prowess of the fairer, weaker sex. Thankfully, Gray is now recognised worldwide as a full member of the pioneers of modernism for her achievements in lacquer-work, furniture design and architecture.

Her imaginings in their original form — rare vintage finds — are appreciated and are suitably expensive to keep us great-unwashed at bay. Her Dragon Chair (c.1917-1919) made for Yves Saint Laurent, sold at auction in Paris for €22 million in 2009. This figure was achieved largely because YSL’s backside regularly connected with the leather but still, it remains a record breaking coup for a single chair.

What most people don’t seem to know is that original furnishings from Gray are swamped in the market by the thousands of Gray ‘style’ reproductions made since the 1970s when her death perked the world’s attention. The odd authentic, battered Bidenbum armchair limps into view every few years at specialist auction and her prototypes are locked into private collections and exhibitions. However, under license Aram Designs Ltd, do produce her work anew priced from the mid-hundreds. Some of Gray’s more diminutive works remains surprisingly affordable, and as yet largely undiscovered — her lighting.

Aram covers the bigger bases — her stepped chrome side light of 1927, a poem of Odeon deco (€230). The Roattino is a snaking Bauhaus floor lamp which in black lacquered steel is very now (€1,275.50). The Satellite is a glorious vanity mirror with two circular mirrors and sanded enclosure for a movable vanity light. POA. Finally they offer her spun-steel Tube Light from 1927 which sits upright in a sharp razor-shell column as a floor lamp (€595).

If you look online through independent retailers in France, Germany and of course on eBay, it’s possible to find two original desk lamps for the lighting house of Jumo attributed to Gray, manufactured from the 1940s to the 1950s.

The first, is the Mermaid, and it has to be said there is some controversy amongst design historians as to whether this sophisticated table lamp can be claimed as a Gray design.

She did design a lacquer and ivory chair of the same name, Le fauteuil dit à la Sirène, which may have confused the assignation of the French made Jumo Mermaid to her; commentators have pointed out however that its method of production is too late to make it a Gray design. Prices for the convinced start at €1,500.

Generally accepted as drawn by Gray, is Model 71 by Jumo, a very Art Deco style articulated desk lamp in ribbed chrome over steel and lacquer to the light housing (later models are finished in a wood veneer).

The base of the Jumo Mermaid serves as the light housing of the 71, making the whole Gray/Mermaid argument even more intriguing.

The 71 appears in grey, cream/white and black in various conditions, and sell for around €200 upwards un-restored with their original metal switches and minimal damage to the vulnerable chrome.

As with any vintage lighting, have the piece checked out and re-wired or you’ll be seared to your mid-century modern desk some quiet afternoon.