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BM1871 Outdoor Bench

c. 1971

by Børge Mogensen
for Carl Hansen & Søn

BM1871 Outdoor Bench

by Børge Mogensen
for  Carl Hansen & Søn

or Call to Order

Designed in 1971, Børge Mogensen’s outdoor bench by Carl Hansen & sons features modern sensi­bil­i­ties yet remains faith­ful to the spirit of its orig­i­nal design. The mini­mal­ist design with simple, clean lines empha­sizes crafts­man­ship and mate­r­ial. The durable design, produced in untreated FSC™-certified teak, with­stands wear and weather to age grace­fully over time, acquir­ing an elegant silver-grey hue. The bench is set on sturdy legs that tuck neatly inside the elegant slatted seat for easy storage when not in use. Avail­able for addi­tional comfort are padded cush­ions in weather-resis­tant Sunbrella fabric.

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Børge Mogensen

Denmark (1914–1972)


Børge Mogensen was one of the pioneers that created the foundation for the Danish Design as a culture of furniture design. His life-long ambition was to create durable and useful furniture that would enrich people’s everyday lives, and he designed functional furniture for all parts of the home and society.

Mogensen’s ideal was to create furniture with a restrained aesthetic. He believed that furniture should create a sense of tranquillity and have a modest appearance that encourages people to live their lives unpretentiously. He was acclaimed for his masterful sense of materials and proportions, and for his ability to create beautiful and distinctive furniture by emphasizing simple horizontal and vertical lines and surfaces – all in an attempt to create aesthetic clear designs that were easy to produce.

While working strictly within his self-imposed dogmas, Mogensen’s artistic temperament often led him to break his formal rules without abandoning their original intent. Thus Mogensen’s furniture can be described as both modest and very self-confident - just as their creator. Throughout his life, Mogensen was one of the boldest voices in the critical debate on furniture design. He often criticized his peers for surrendering their artistic authenticity in favor of short-sighted fashions, but he always welcomed innovations that he found offered real progression. Mogensen preferred to work in refined, yet rustic, natural materials such as solid oak, natural leather, wool fabrics, and brass mountings.

Mogensen was a trained cabinet-maker and furniture designer at the Copenhagen School of Arts and Crafts before entering the school of furniture design at Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, where he was taught by Kaare Klint and graduated in 1941. Throughout his career, Mogensen continued to defend the ideals of evolutionary design progression that was essential to the Klint School, while also expanding on the tradition. Contrary to Klint, Mogensen was not only inspired by the traditional cabinet-maker’s types and crafts - instead he adapted models planned for industrial production, as well as the more informal housing that emerged in the 1960s.

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