EDWARD WORMLEY (1907 - 1995) was one of the leading Midcentury Modern furniture designers. He attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1926 to 1928 and took his first job in the interior design studio at Marshall Field + Company department store. In 1931, Wormley was recruited by DUNBAR and quickly became their Director of Design. Wormley’s tenure as Design Director spanned over thirty years and is considered one of the most historically meaningful between a designer and manufacturer.

Wormley’s genius was in his conversancy with design history, attention to detail, and his very conviviality. He possessed a keen eye for style and proportion, an ability to work both with fine materials and industrial techniques, and a commitment to comfort and flexibility. His best designs rank with the best designs of the period, either for usefulness and economic value or for sheer exuberance and imagination. Wormley’s career represents a complex achievement: balancing old and new, he created a body of work that was comfortable and familiar, yet still managed to send the underlying message of modernism to places it might not otherwise have reached.

(Source: Dunbar + Wright Auctions)