Jens_Quistgaard_Fjord_Pattern_silverware

Dansk Designs (also known as Dansk International Designs starting in 1954) is an American distributor and retailer of cookware, tableware, and other home accessories based in

Mount Kisco, New York Mount Kisco is a Administrative divisions of New York#Village, village and Administrative divisions of New York#Town, town in Westchester County, New York, United States. The town of Mount Kisco is coterminous municipality, coterminous with the vil ...

. , the brand was called Dansk and was a wholly owned subsidiary of Lenox Corporation with headquarters located in

Bristol, Pennsylvania Bristol is a borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located northeast of Center City Philadelphia, opposite Burlington, New Jersey on the Delaware River. It antedates Philadelphia, being settled in 1681 and first incorporat ...

. As of 2021, the brand Dansk was acquired by Food52.

History

On a trip to

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

in 1954, Americans

Martha Martha (Hebrew: מָרְתָא‎) is a biblical figure described in the Gospels of Luke and John. Together with her siblings Lazarus and Mary of Bethany, she is described as living in the village of Bethany near Jerusalem. She was witness to ...

and

Ted Nierenberg Theodore David "Ted" Nierenberg (May 20, 1923 – July 31, 2009) was an American business executive and entrepreneur who created Dansk International Designs, a company that sells Scandinavian Design-style cooking and serving utensils and othe ...

went in search of a product to manufacture and produce for a U.S. audience. During a visit to the Museum of Arts and Crafts ''Kunstindustrimuseet'' (today the

Danish Museum of Art & Design The Designmuseum Denmark () is a museum in Copenhagen for Danish and international design and crafts. It features works of famous Danish designers like Arne Jacobsen, Jacob Jensen and Kaare Klint, who was one of the two architects who remodeled ...

''Designmuseum Danmark'') in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

, they saw a unique set of cutlery on display that combined

teak Teak (''Tectona grandis'') is a tropical hardwood tree species in the family Lamiaceae. It is a large, deciduous tree that occurs in mixed hardwood forests. ''Tectona grandis'' has small, fragrant white flowers arranged in dense clusters (panicl ...

and

stainless steel Stainless steel is an alloy of iron that is resistant to rusting and corrosion. It contains at least 11% chromium and may contain elements such as carbon, other nonmetals and metals to obtain other desired properties. Stainless steel's corros ...

, created by artist-designer Jens Quistgaard.Fox, Margalit
"Jens Quistgaard, 88, a Designer of Popular Tableware, Is Dead"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', February 2, 2008. Accessed August 4, 2009. The Nierenbergs tracked down Quistgaard and spoke with him in an effort to convince him to manufacture the cutlery. At first, Quistgaard insisted that the pieces could only be

forged Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die. Forging is often classified according to the temperature at which it ...

by hand, one piece at a time, but Nierenberg was able to convince him they could be mass-produced, leading to Dansk Designs' first product, ''Fjord'' flatware, which has been one of the brand's enduring bestsellers.Fox, Margalit
"Theodore Nierenberg, Founder of Dansk, Dies at 86"
''

'', August 3, 2009. Accessed August 4, 2009. The Nierenbergs established Dansk that year in the garage of their

Great Neck, New York Great Neck is a region on Long Island, New York, that covers a peninsula on the North Shore (Long Island), North Shore and includes nine villages, among them Great Neck (village), New York, Great Neck, Great Neck Estates, New York, Great Neck Es ...

, home, with Quistgaard as its founding designer. The name is the

Danish Danish may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Denmark People * A national or citizen of Denmark, also called a "Dane," see Demographics of Denmark * Culture of Denmark * Danish people or Danes, people with a Danish a ...

word for ''Danish''. By the end of 1954, Ted Nierenberg attracted orders for several hundred units from stores all around the United States, and the business took off from there.Reif, Rita
"Accessories Designed by Dane Proving Popular in U.S. Homes; Jens Quistgaard, Son of Noted Sculptor, a Born Craftsman"
''

'', October 10, 1958. Accessed August 4, 2009. By 1958, Nierenberg and Quistgaard had expanded Dansk's wares to include teak magazine racks and stools, stoneware casseroles, salt and pepper grinders, and flatware with split cane handles. ''

'' credited Dansk with "creating a stir" with "some of the most popular accessories found in American homes." As the company name suggested, Dansk came to epitomize

Danish modern Danish modern is a style of minimalist furniture and housewares from Denmark associated with the Danish design movement. In the 1920s, Kaare Klint embraced the principles of Bauhaus modernism in furniture design, creating clean, pure lines based ...

design in the urban American market. By 1982, Quistgaard had created more than 2,000 different designs for Dansk of dinnerware, glassware and items for the home. Dansk relocated its headquarters to

, in the 1960s. Dansk was purchased in June 1985 by Dansk Acquisition Corp. in a deal initiated by

Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs () is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered at 200 West Street in Lower Manhattan, with regional headquarters in London, Warsaw, Bangalore, H ...

. Dansk was acquired in 1991 by the Brown-Forman Corporation and incorporated together under its Lenox subsidiary. On March 16, 2009, a group of investors led by Clarion Capital Partners LLC purchased the assets of Lenox—including Dansk—and renamed the company Lenox Corporation. As of January 2018, Dansk continues as a brand of Lenox. Dansk designs are recognised for their artistic merit and several examples are held in the collection of the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

. In May 2021, Food52, the content-to-commerce platform founded by

Amanda Hesser Amanda Hesser (born 1971) is an American food writer, editor, cookbook author and entrepreneur. Most notably, she was the food editor of ''The New York Times Magazine'', the editor of '' T Living'', a quarterly publication of ''The New York Times'' ...

, purchased Dansk from Center Lane Partners with plans to revive the brand.

References

External links

Official siteDansk collection in the

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum housed within the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile. It is one of 19 museums that fall under the wing of the Smithsonian Ins ...

{{Authority control Companies based in Westchester County, New York Retail companies established in 1954 Home decor retailers 1954 establishments in New York (state) Cutlery brands