VLADIMIR KAGAN

Vladimir Kagan is one of today's most enduring designers of modern furniture with a career that has spanned over fifty-five years. He started designing in 1947 and by the early Fifties, his innovative sculptured furniture created a new look in American furniture. Today, his sparkling creations are on the cutting edge of the 21st century. His designs are spearheading creative designs for hotels, furniture, textiles and home furnishings. The European Magazine says: “Vladimir Kagan is one of the most important furniture designers of the 20th century. Furniture designed by him in the forties, fifties and sixties have become icons of Modernity and an obligatory reference to every designer. He is the creative grandfather of a whole new generation of designers.”

Born in Worms on the Rhine, Germany in 1927, Vladimir Kagan came to the United States in 1938. His earliest focus was on painting and sculpture but in his formative years he became exceedingly attracted to architecture and design. He studied Architecture at Columbia University and in 1947 joined his father, Illi Kagan, a master cabinetmaker, to work in his woodworking shop and learn furniture making from the ground up.

Early commissions included the Delegate's Cocktail Lounges for the first United Nations Headquarters in Lake Success N.Y. (1947-48). In 1949 he opened his first shop in New York on East 65th Street and moved to fashionable 57th Street in 1950. His clients were luminaries in the world of art, theater, music and industry. They including Marilyn Monroe, Xavier Cougar, Lilly Pons, and Gary Cooper; Sherman Fairchild of Fairchild Aviation, Walt Disney, General Electric, Monsanto, General Motors, Prudential Insurance, and the Government of Venezuela.

Connoisseurs and museums are avidly collecting his designs. Kagan’s furniture is in the private collections of Barbara Jacobson of the Museum of Modern Art, film director David Lynch, actor Dan Akroyd, the Spice Girls and David Bowie, as well as the late artists Andy Warhol, Robert Mapplethorpe, Frank Sinatra and Violinist Isaac Stern. Fashion designers Tom Ford, Donna Karan, Giorgio Armani, Joseph, Elie Tahari, Roberto Cavalli, and Anna Fendi are all Kagan collectors. His prize-winning designs have been published in books and magazines internationally and are in the permanent collections of the V&A, London, the Vitra Design Museum and Die Neue Samlung in Germany, the Brooklyn Museum, the Cooper Hewitt Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Pasadena Art Institute, Baltimore Museum of Fine Arts, Chicago's Athenaeum and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In the fall of 2004 Vladimir Kagan’s autobiography: The Complete Kagan, 272 pages with over 400 photos and illustrations will be published by Pointed Leaf Press.In 2001, Tom Ford used his Omnibus seating designs from the 70’ for all of Gucci's 360 stores. Armani selected his Cubist Dining chairs and Banquets for the new Nobu restaurant in Milan. Andre Belasze chose Mr. Kagan to design the lobby of his newest hotel, The Standard Downtown in Los Angeles and this past May, Mr. Kagan installed the World’s largest Omnibus Sofa grouping in the Lobby of this hotel.

Corporate enterprises from BMW to L. V. M. H. Helena Rubenstein, NBC television and many more, are using his furniture for their corporate headquarters, exhibits and events.

Vladimir Kagan’s Skulptur Couture Collection is a limited edition of authentic reproductions custom made in the United States under Mr. Kagan’s personal supervision. These designs are available through selected showrooms. In addition Vladimir Kagan’s designs are available through licensed manufacturers worldwide. His American manufacturers include Weiman Preview Furniture, American Leather, Directional, Mark David and Thief River Linens. His European licensees include Club House Italia, Roche Bobois Carpet Creations Ltd. and Fasem. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION

In 2004 Vladimir Kagan has been nominated for two National Design Award: Lifetime Achievement Award and Environmental Design Award. Winners to be presented at the Cooper Hewitt Museum in the fall of 2004.

On November 13th 2002, Vladimir Kagan received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Brooklyn Museum Art at a ceremony held in conjunction with the Modernism Show at the Park Avenue Armory in New York.

In 2001, Vladimir Kagan received an Honorary Doctor of Arts degree from Kendall College of Art and Design bestowed by the Board of Trustees of Ferris State University of Grand Rapids Michigan.

In 2001, he received the Pinnacle Award from the American Society of Furniture Designers for one of his Sofas for the American Leather Company.

In 2000, he was honored with The Lifetime Achievement Award of the American Society of Furniture Designers.

In January 2000, he took his designs international with the introduction of The Kagan New York Collection for Club House Italia, at the Cologne Furniture Fair.

In 1992 Mr. Kagan reintroduced a limited edition of his Classic Designs, which are available today as The Kagan Skulptur Couture Collection.

From 1990 to 1992 Mr. Kagan served as President of the American Society of Interior Designers, A. S. I. D. New York Metropolitan Chapter.

In 1980, New York's Fashion Institute of Technology honored Mr. Kagan with a thirty-year retrospective exhibit: Vladimir Kagan: Three Decades of Design

He has served as chairman of the Advisory Commission of the School of Art and Design in New York and been a member on numerous committees for the Architectural League of New York. He has served on the faculty of New York's Parsons School of Design and has lectured extensively on the history of modern design in furniture and architecture.

Vladimir Kagan is married to Erica Wilson, internationally known needlework designer, author and Television personality. They have three children and live between their homes in New York and Nantucket.