Art Deco in 2026: Celebrating 100 Years of Timeless Elegance

1930s Swedish Art Deco Bronze Mirror with Shell Crown

$3795

The Art Deco movement's fascination with exotic materials found perfect expression in shell work, where natural forms were geometricized into decorative elements. This 1930s Swedish mirror exemplifies the period's approach to luxury through its bronze frame crowned with shell motifs—a technique that transformed organic shapes into architectural ornament. The bronze patina speaks to Art Deco's metalwork tradition, while the shell crown demonstrates how designers of the era elevated humble materials through precise craftsmanship. In contemporary interiors, such pieces serve as focal points that bridge natural and manufactured beauty. The mirror's symmetrical composition and stepped crown details embody Art Deco's fundamental principle: nature refined through geometric discipline. This synthesis of organic inspiration with industrial precision remains relevant in today's design landscape, where authentic craftsmanship carries renewed cultural weight.

Soft Ply Floor Lamp Series

$3083

Art Deco's embrace of new manufacturing techniques finds contemporary expression in Sheyang Li's Soft Ply series, where laminated birch and poplar create the stepped, ziggurat-like forms synonymous with the movement. The lamp's angular silhouette recalls the setback architecture of 1920s skyscrapers, while its plywood construction speaks to Art Deco's celebration of industrial materials elevated through design sophistication. The aluminium accents provide the metallic gleam essential to the style's luxury aesthetic. This piece demonstrates how contemporary makers interpret Art Deco's formal language through modern materials and production methods. The lamp's geometric progression—each layer building upon the last—embodies the movement's architectural thinking applied to domestic objects. In today's interiors, such pieces bridge the gap between handcraft and industrial production, honoring Art Deco's revolutionary merger of art and technology while addressing contemporary concerns for sustainable materials and manufacturing processes.

USO Floor Lamp

$4151

Art Deco's colonial-era fascination with exotic materials manifests in Lana Launay's USO lamp, where ash wood meets raffia in a dialogue between European craft traditions and global material culture. The combination recalls the movement's appropriation of African, Asian, and Pacific motifs, though here approached with contemporary sensitivity to cultural exchange. The lamp's sculptural form demonstrates Art Deco's theatrical sensibility—objects designed not merely for function but as stage sets for modern living. Raffia, traditionally associated with vernacular craft, gains sophistication through its pairing with refined ash wood, embodying Art Deco's elevation of humble materials through design intelligence. This material juxtaposition creates the textural richness that defined interiors of the 1920s and 1930s, where smooth lacquers met rough textures, polished metals contrasted with natural fibers. In contemporary spaces, such pieces provide the material complexity that distinguishes Art Deco from minimalist aesthetics, offering sensory richness that engages both sight and touch.

"Feels Like Home" Floor Lamp

$4566

Lana Launay's "Feels Like Home" lamp embodies Art Deco's maximalist approach to materials, combining wood, beech, steel, stainless steel, tin, raffia, and paper in a single object. This material abundance reflects the movement's rejection of Arts and Crafts simplicity in favor of industrial luxury and global material culture. Each material contributes its own character—the warmth of wood, the industrial precision of steel, the organic texture of raffia, the delicacy of paper—creating the layered complexity that defined Art Deco interiors. The lamp's construction method, incorporating both traditional joinery and modern metalwork, mirrors the movement's synthesis of craft heritage with industrial innovation. This approach to making—where multiple materials and techniques converge in a single object—represents Art Deco's fundamental optimism about technology's capacity to enhance rather than diminish human creativity. In contemporary practice, such material complexity challenges the reductive tendencies of minimalism, offering instead a vision of luxury grounded in craft knowledge and material exploration.

1950s Jewel-Toned Mirror Attributed to Mithé Espelt

$1305

The jewel-toned mirror attributed to Mithé Espelt represents Art Deco's fascination with colored glass and optical effects, techniques that transformed functional objects into decorative spectacles. Espelt's work, emerging from the post-war period, carried forward Art Deco's commitment to glass as both material and medium, where surface treatment became as important as form. The mirror's jewel-like quality recalls the movement's appropriation of precious stone aesthetics in accessible materials—a democratization of luxury through industrial technique. This approach to surface—where color, reflection, and texture create visual complexity—embodies Art Deco's theatrical sensibility, its understanding of interiors as stages for modern performance. The piece demonstrates how colored glass can function as both mirror and artwork, creating spatial depth while serving practical needs. In contemporary interiors, such objects provide the optical drama that distinguishes Art Deco from more restrained design approaches, offering surfaces that change with light conditions and viewing angles, maintaining the movement's commitment to dynamic visual experience.