Inside The Design Center / Mingei Museum
Inside the Design Center
Ilse and Lloyd Ruocco’s Design Center, located in the Hillcrest neighborhood of San Diego, was a foundation for the modern design community of the 1950s, ‘60s, and ‘70s. Inside the Design Center brings to life a vignette of mid-twentieth century interior, lighting, and furniture design, featuring pieces by significant California designers, manufacturers, and craftspeople as selected by Ilse Ruocco for her 1950 showroom.
This exhibition offers an immersive, revelatory window into San Diego’s culture of modernism through the lens of architecture, design, interior decorating, home goods retailing, landscape architecture, graphic design, and photography. Historic images of the Design Center set the backdrop for over 30 original pieces of modernist furnishings. Works by designers such as Ray Eames, Charles Eames, Greta Magnusson Grossman, Dorothy Schindele, Milo Baughman, and Edith Heath of Heath Ceramics are included.
Guest Co-Curators: Dave Hampton with Steve Aldana and Todd Pitman
The exhibition concept started 20 years ago when Dave Hampton came across this 1950 ad in San Diego Magazine. Since then, he has been exploring the deeper story within the ad featuring Ilse Ruocco’s Design Center showroom. The show is based off the ad and displays the same furniture in the Mingei. The exhibition also tells the story of Lloyd and Ilse Ruocco, those who had offices in the building, and includes a film showing the construction of the building itself.
Todd Pitman is the Lloyd Ruocco scholar and has been researching him for the past 30 years. He runs the Lloyd Ruocco Archive and lives in a Rucoco home. In addition to providing background on Llyod and Ilse, he wrote the panels on the architects who had spaces in the Design Center.
My role was to help identify and source primarily the California-designed pieces. Dave and I also wrote the text on the designers and manufacturers in the exhibition guide. Some of that text is included in this post.
I'll get into this a little more below, but this exhibition could not have happened without the generosity of the lenders, who in two cases are giving up their family dining tables for over six months.
Then there's the Mingei team who allowed Dave's vision to happen. It's such an amazing group of talented people, including our Objects USA buddy Ron. If you're not a Mingei member, you should be.
While Ilse's showroom included some icons like Eames LCWs and a Saarinen womb chair, there were a number of more esoteric™ pieces, which weren't seen in typical shops of the day. This Milo Baughman for Modern Color Inc tray table is a prime example. It's only the second one I've seen in person and even period photos are scarce. It was loaned by John Chatfield after he outbid me on it at auction. It's OK though, he's been outbidding me for years and we're still friends. John has an incredible collection and house.
1949 ad from Arts & Architecture magazine
The Greta Grossman for Modern Color Inc. folding chaise is so rare that a replica had to be fabricated for the exhibition. No one has ever seen the chaise outside of a handful of vintage photos.
In addition to having friends with good collections, we also have some that were able to help with this. Architect John Ike had the CAD drawings made from the vintage images. Jay Floral did the actual welding and fabrication. Andy Hackman made sure it was done right and managed the finishing. It was down to the wire but it came out undoubtedly better than when Modern Color Inc made them. Incidentally, all three of these people also have great vintage collections.
Greta Magnusson Grossman (1906–1999) was a Swedish-born designer and architect known for her work in furniture, interiors, and architecture. In 1940, due to the political climate in Europe, Grossman moved to Los Angeles with her husband. They established the Magnusson-Grossman Studio in Beverly Hills. The studio specialized in furniture and lighting design, collaborating with companies such as Sherman Bertram, Martin Brattrud, Modern Color, Inc., Cal-Mode, Barker Brothers, INCO, Ralph O. Smith, and Glenn of California.
Although not a licensed architect, Grossman designed 28 homes, mostly in the Los Angeles area. She was on the board of the Association of Women in Architecture and taught at UCLA. She retired from design and architecture in 1966 and relocated with her husband to Encinitas, just north of San Diego. This would be the last house she designed and one of a handful that have not been demolished. Grossman spent the last three decades of her life in quiet seclusion, painting landscapes in Southern California.
Dorothy Schindele chairs from the collection of Steve Temme and JC Miller, and dining table (probably by Schindele). They were both produced by Modern Color Inc. The ads and catalog don't say who designed the table. This is the other case we had to get a replica made. This time it was Jason Lane who made the top and David Montes de Oca Gutierrez who had the metal frame fabricated. We actually had a vintage one lined up but the loan fell through. Jason and David saved the day.
This catalog image came from the collection of Eugene Weston, whose pieces are pictures on the bottom left. It is courtesy of Ten 10.
Dorothy Schindele (née Geneva Owens) (1918–1998) was born in North Dakota and moved to Los Angeles in 1940. She started her furniture company, Modern Color, Inc. in 1949—first, out of her modern home designed by Case Study House architect Rodney Walker and then a commercial space in the Silver Lake neighborhood. Her designs utilized steel rods, often bent, combined with other materials like upholstery and basketry. Architectural photographer Julius Shulman produced product photography for Schindele, shot a portrait of her, and used her designs in his own home. After Modern Color, Inc. went out of business in 1955, a short-lived venture in Laguna Beach called Laguna Living continued to produce a limited number of her designs. In the mid-1960s, she worked for EBSCO information services, giving presentations on interior design.
Photo: Julius Shulman photography archive, GRI Special Collections
Van Keppel-Green (VKG) table from a private collection.
Hendrik Van Keppel (1914–1988) and Taylor Green (1914–1991), both California natives and UC Berkeley alumni, met in Los Angeles in 1937 and started working together. In 1941, they launched their design firm, with Van Keppel handling design and Green managing the business. After WWII, their furniture gained popularity, especially through the Case Study House program by Arts & Architecture magazine, owned by their longtime friend John Entenza. Although they manufactured most of their own furniture, they also designed lines for Brown Saltman, Mueller, The Holly Line, and Balboa Chrome.
Yes, that is a Tackett pitcher.
A ceramic piece by Ilse Ruocco. My photo doesn't do it justice. It's part of Mingei's collection.
Luther Conover was a bit of a surprise to see in the Design Center ad. Conover was based in Sausalito and distribution was centered in the Bay Area through his own shop, help from Jackson's in Oakland and California Contemporary in San Leandro. This was also before the big Pacifica push that would happen in 1951. The dining table is from Esteban del Rio. The coffee table is from Eric Huff. The stools are from collection of Steve Temme and JC Miller.
Luther Conover designed and manufactured his furniture in his Sausalito, California shop starting in 1947.
Gio Ponti flatware from the flatware king of New York, Dung Ngo. He also help identify it from the ad, which was no small feat. The flatware was likely distributed by Fraser's in Berkeley. Dung has a flatware book in the works and an exhibition at the Denver Art Museum happening next year. A little more about his flatware collection, here.
The Heath Ceramics belongs to Steve Temme and JC Miller . JC was a contributor to the Edith Heath exhibition and associated book that happened at the Oakland Museum of Art in 2022. He has also done a lot of research and writing on Robert Royston and curated this excellent exhibition.
John Dirks salad servers from the collection of Modern San Diego. The bowl is by Walter Chapman, and is from the collection of Mingei.
VKG floor candle holder from the collection of Maz Kattuah. Nobody really knows how much VKG Maz has (maybe not even him) but I'm sure it's the largest collection anywhere.
As seen is Case study House 1950 by Raphael Soriano
Richard Stein daybed for Knoll, from the collection of Modern San Diego.
As you can see here, the back lowers to become a bed.
Richard Stein (1916–1990) was born in Chicago and attended Cooper Union before earning architecture degrees from New York University and Harvard University, where he studied with Walter Gropius and worked for Gropius and Marcel Breuer. During World War II, he served in the Army Corps of Engineers then moved to New York in 1946, where he taught at Cooper Union from 1946–1990 and became a principal with the firm Katz Waisman Blumenkranz Stein Weber, Architects Associated. In 1947, his design for a cleverly convertible modern daybed was produced, domestically, and also in Europe, by Knoll Associates. Looking relaxed and sporting a bowtie in this all-star photo of Knoll designers, Stein can be seen sharing his popular daybed with artist and textile designer Noémi Raymond. (Bio by Dave Hampton)
The Gilbert Watrous lamp is the one piece that isn't pictured in the ad, but his name is listed in the text. It's grouped with the furniture designers and not in the lighting section, which is a bit puzzling. According to Hampton, Watrous had moved from San Diego to Chicago to study at the Institute of Design when a lamp design competition was announced by MoMA and the Heifetz Company. Although the ad for the competition was published in December 1950, entries had already closed, and Watrous may have already won. The public showing of the winning lamps wouldn’t occur until 1951. It's likely his friends in San Diego included his name in the ad, knowing he had won. The lamp in the exhibition is from the collection of Todd Pitman and was a gift from Watrous to Lloyd Ruocco. It's hard to get better provenance than that.
The womb chair is on loan from Esteban del Rio. That is great provenance on its own but Esteban and the the chair also call the John Dirks house home. John built the house himself but it's speculated that he had design help from Lloyd Ruocco. Esteban is also my bike mentor.
Photo: Justin Chung, via Canyon Coffee
George Nakashima for Knoll dining table from the collection of Tamara Wall. The Andre Dupre for Knoll chairs belong to Maz. Unlike Tammy, who gave up her dining table for the exhibition, Maz is probably just happy to have free storage for several months.
Interesting fact, nobody has any biographical information on Dupre, including Knoll. There is a mention in one period article that he was based in Paris but that's about it. This design was produced by Knoll for almost 20 years.
201 Armless Chair in original fabric and NK6 Table, both designed by Elias Svedberg and manufactured by Nordiska Kompaniet in Sweden and imported by Knoll, from a private collection.
The son of prominent Swedish parents, a Nobel Prize winning chemist and an esteemed physician and women’s health advocate, Johan Elias Svedberg (1913–1987) self-directed much of his early professional training. He studied crafts with Carl Malmsten at age 15 and architectural drawing and art history in Stockholm. He learned about woodworking before visiting the U.S. in 1933, where he took an industrial design course at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and subsequently traveled to the Soviet Union to study collective housing. Svedberg practiced as a freelance furniture designer and interior and exhibition architect but became well known for his Nordiska Kompaniet (NK) department store designs and so-called “Swedish Modern” furnishings displayed at the World’s Fairs in Paris 1937 and New York in 1939. His innovative Triva collections, modified throughout the 1940s by NK, could be shipped in flat packages and assembled by the customer a full decade before IKEA. Svedberg’s flat-packed tables and desks made from birch and elm and the upholstered 201 armless chair, all manufactured by NK, were imported and sold by Knoll Associates immediately following World War II. (Bio by Dave Hampton)
Harry Lawenda for Kneedler-Fauchere, from the collection of John Chatfield. I told you he has a great collection.
$50 is 1950 was not cheap!
Kneedler Fauchère (1948–2025) traces its beginnings to a World War II internment camp in the Philippines, where Dorothy Kneedler—an American and the wife of a hotel manager—met Lucienne Fauchère, a Frenchwoman. After the war, the two women relocated to California, and in 1948, founded one of the country’s first multiline showrooms at the Marines Memorial Building in San Francisco, offering New York textile lines and Asian wallcoverings.
In 1949, as the company grew, Dorothy made a sales call on Harry Lawenda, a local furniture store interior design director. Dorothy invited him to visit the showroom, and he was hired. Kneedler, by then divorced, would go on to marry Lawenda who soon became a business partner.
Harry Lawenda (1923–2011), a native of New York, served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy Amphibious Forces during World War II. After the war, he studied at Parsons School of Design and, upon graduating, worked as a designer and decorator for various firms in New York City.
At Kneedler-Fauchere, Lawenda designed furniture, textiles, wall coverings, and lighting. His 1951 collection—which included a line of iron lamps, a sofa, a chair, and a candelabra—won several awards from the American Institute of Decorators and was featured in the Pacifica marketing campaign.
Candle Holder, designed by Henrik Van Keppel, from the collection of Maz Kattuah.
25 Armchair and 26 Sofa, designed by Florence Knoll from a private collection
731 Floor Lamp, designed by Greta Magnusson Grossman and manufactured by Ralph O. Smith Co., 1949, Collection of R & Company. They have been longtime believers in Grossman's importance in the design world. They have produced multiple books and exhibitions on Grossman, including this one in 2012.
Industrial engineer Ralph O. Smith headquartered his lamp manufacturing business out of a modest home in Burbank, California. All the lamps were designed by three women; Greta Magnusson Grossman, Olga Lee and Pat Wilson. The company only employed up to three people and that included two machinists who produced the lamps. All the designs utilized spun aluminum shades with steel, iron or brass components. Two of the lamps were selected for MoMA Good Design exhibitions. This includes a design by Olga Lee and the Grossman Cobra Lamp, which was also “merit specified” by Arts & Architecture Magazine for use in Case Study House 1950 . Grossman’s designs made up the bulk of the catalog, being offered in 10 colors with various configurations and shade combinations. The company’s tagline was “light where you want it” to note the functionality of the directional shades.
66W1 chairs by Jens Risom from a private collection
Inside the Design Center
Outside the Design Center, which is still there and looking great.
You get extra credit if you go see it. It's only a 30 minute walk or 5 minute drive from Mingei. Here's a map.
Photo: CA Modern magazine
The exhibition runs until April 12th. Read more about it and the associated programming, here. Maybe I'll see you at Breakfast with Eames?