Midcentury design ‘Eye’ model clock

Designer
George Nelson
Manufacturer
Unknown
Period
1960s
Origin
unknown
Material
Brass, Metal, wood
Color
Multicolor
Code
10060121OO
Condition
Good and working condition, consistent with age and use.
Dimensions
76cm ((w) x 8cm (d) x 32cm (h)
WS
A - B
Price
Sold, mv0422
Provenance
See writing below.

George Nelson had been Herman Miller design director since 1945 till he died in 1986. In 1947 he founded his own design studio George Nelson Associates and Howard C. Miller commissioned him to design a collection of electric clocks. It would be easier to manufacture than the complicated mantle clocks.

Nelson analyzed how people interact with clocks and used those findings to carry out his assignment: First, he hypothesized that time could be read from the relative position of the hands and that numbers were therefore unnecessary. Second, he hypothesized that, since wristwatches became more common, wall clocks served less to indicate time and were more likely to be seen as decorative elements in a room’s design.

On the basis of these considerations, a first collection of fourteen wall clocks and compact table clocks that were very innovative for that time was created and entered the market in 1949. The only thing in common was that the figures had been omitted, otherwise the imaginative, graphic shapes of the models could not have been more diverse. One of the first wall clocks, which became an icon of mid-twentieth-century American design in the following decades, was the most famous Ball Clock.

In the ensuing 35 years of collaboration with Howard Miller, the designers at George Nelson Associates designed more than 100 clocks, wall clocks, mobile table clocks and built-in clocks. When George Nelson died in 1986, his estate of approximately 7,400 manuscripts, plans, drawings, photographs and slides from 1924 to 1984 went to the Vitra Design Museum. In 1999 the Nelson clocks were re-introduced by Vitra.

This eye clock has no brandmark, has a battery driven motor and is working well. Good condition consistent with age and use.

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