Retro furnishings have become the signature of swank among the city's lounge bars and have found their way into the homes of well-heeled hipsters. Feeding the frenzy, local outfitters say, is an appetite for the unusual.
"There was never stuff like this Taiwan," said Danny Yang (
That the streamlined simplicity of Scandinavian designs first popular in the 1950s and the futuristic forms of the 1960s are finding favor in Taiwan is noteworthy.
As designers in the West were experimenting with molded plywood furniture, local streets were being lined with poured concrete buildings to house an enormous population influx from China.
Like architecture, furniture design in Taiwan didn't flourish in the decades following the Chinese Civil War. And though many of the retro furnishings now found in swank establishments were originally produced as affordable alternatives for America's emerging middle class, they're now being sold in local boutiques for top dollar.
A sofa styled after Miers van der Rohe's classic cantilevered Barcelona chair can cost upwards of NT$20,000. Harry Betoia's 1951 wire mesh Diamond chair has never gone out of production, but an early model in good condition can cost more than the average monthly paycheck. Local collectors pay an item's going rate, plus the cost of shipping from the US or Europe.
PHOTO: DAVID MOMPHARD, TAIPEI TIMES
Boutique owners like Yang say their biggest customers are lounge bars and retailers who spruce their shops with retro tables for displaying merchandise and lamps for lighting it, but complain that while Taiwanese have acquired a taste for the pieces, they haven't developed an appreciation for their prices.
"There is a gap in understanding here in Taiwan between what is considered used and what is collectible," said Jack Wang, proprietor of Uncle Jack's, a boutique of retro furniture, lamps and art objects in the city's trendy East Area.
"People think that because something is second-hand -- and maybe plastic -- that it should cost NT$200, but really it's maybe NT$20,000."
Before the market can get bigger, he says, people need to understand more about the history of the items that catch their eye.
Several factors combined to make the 1950s a dramatically different decade from the one before it. World War II had ended and tens of thousands of American GIs returned to a dearth of housing.
The Levitt family of New York-area real estate developers started building affordable houses on Long Island, a postwar settlement that would become known as Levittown.
Their new homes were smaller than their pre-war predecessors but were the first homes in America to introduce open-plan design. Sizable living rooms boasted a large "picture window" on the front and a see-through fireplace dividing the living room and kitchen or dining area.
Best of all, they were priced between US$8,000 and US$10,000 and new owners could move in with a deposit of just US$500. Levittown became the model for tract home developments across the country.
To fill these unique homes, unique furnishings were needed and aiding designers of the time was a host of new materials to work with: plastic, vinyl, fiberglass, aluminum, PVC and Formica. They were so easily molded and durable that the materials themselves became fashionable.
The husband-and-wife design team of Charles and Ray Eames took it upon themselves to create durable and affordable home furnishings. They started with molded plywood designs that today are highly-prized among collectors, but soon began working with fiberglass. Eschewing padded wood frames, the couple sought to design chairs and chase lounges molded to comfortably support the human shape.
"What works is better than what looks good," Ray Eames once famously said, "What looks good can change, but what works, works."
Advances in science also started to show up in home-furnishing design. Stackable plastic and aluminum chairs were introduced and an increasing fascination with space exploration led to fiberglass chaise lounges and appliances.
Wall-to-wall carpeting became the rage after the advent of the technology to make it and those who couldn't afford it often went for Edward Fields' area rugs patterned after kimono designs and Piet Mondrian-like montages of lines and geometric shapes. Where the previous generation fashioned their staid furniture from wood and leather, the Fabulous 50s favored primary colors, Formica finishes and bold, cylindrical or spherical shapes.
"In Taiwan, there was very little choice in furniture for the average family," Yang said. "So these old pieces are special not only for being imported, but for being so different than anything else available ? then or now."
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