Inspired by the Danish furniture industry’s success in the 1950s, B&O tried out various Danish designers. Unit furniture was designed by the architect Ib Fabiansen in 1959. The Building Furniture concept combined television and audio in one unit. These modular furniture units were exhibited at the Danish Arts & Crafts Exhibition in Charlottenborg, Copenhagen, 1958.
Among others, Fabiansen designed the Beocord Belcanto Type 608 (1962) and the Horisont Television (1962).
“… there was a time when it was far from a certainty that a radio from Bang and Olufsen was a study in good design… “It was horrible, simply horrible,” says architect Ib Fabiansen, who was the first architect to begin to designing radios for the little factory in Struer. Together with Jakob Jensen, B&O’s in-house designer for many years, he tells the story of a West Jutlandic factory, which wasn’t wasn’t the least bit interested in shape and design at the beginning.” (Fra baggård til big business: Verdens Pæneste Lyd, Danish Radio 2, 17.11.02)
Ib Fabiansen’s firm maintains an office in Frederiksberg, an independent city within the boundaries of Copenhagen. Fabiansen himself designed at least one house in Frederiksberg.
Notes:
Pictured – Ib Fabiensen demonstrates the flexibility of his modular system in 1959.
