Gerald Summers & Marjorie Butcher: Makers of Simple Furniture, 1931–1940

In 1931, the English designer Gerald Summers and his partner Marjorie Butcher opened their business, Makers of Simple Furniture, in London. Until 1940, the company produced hundreds of ingenious plywood designs that helped define the idea of the modern interior in Great Britain. Based on Marjorie Butcher’s vivid recollections and a wealth of unpublished material—including photographs, personal correspondence, designs and workshop documents—the book traces the groundbreaking achievements of the furniture company best known for the iconic Bent Plywood Armchair. The publication was supported in part by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. GERALD SUMMERS (1899-1967) is one of the foremost furniture designers of the twentieth century. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, he worked as an engineer before starting his design career. In 1931, he and his partner, MARJORIE BUTCHER (1909-1996), opened Makers of Simple Furniture in London. They managed the firm for almost ten years, producing hundreds of pieces for the modern home. In 1940, wartime exigencies brought an end to the enterprise. They redirected their energy to Gerald Summers Ltd. , a supplier of engineering parts. MARTHA DEESE is an authority on Gerald Summers. She earned a master’s degree in decorative art history from Cooper-Hewitt Museum/Parsons School of Design, New York, and worked for three decades as an administrator at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Her groundbreaking article on Summers and his firm, Makers of Simple Furniture, published in the Journal of Design History in 1992, remains the principal source on the designer.