In the latter half of the 1990s, midcentury American studio furniture appeared seemingly out of nowhere like a giant ocean swell, flooding a vintage-modern market then dominated by the neat forms of George Nelson, Eero Saarinen and Charles and Ray Eames. These curious pieces were like rarefied flotsam and jetsam, encompassing work by figures as diverse as J. B. Blunk, the Bay Area potter who used a chain saw to carve organic furniture out of great hunks of redwood, and T. H. Robsjohn Gibbings, the erudite British transplant who brought classical Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Asian influence to his distinct furniture.

Dealers were as fascinated by these forms as they were frustrated. There was little documentation about their makers, and without it, the works were no more than compelling second hand furnishings. While there have been a number of articles, monographs and exhibitions on American studio design and its practitioners in the past two decades, Modern Americana, written by one of the dealers who pioneered its revival, Todd Merrill, and the design journalist Julie V. Iovine, is the first comprehensive survey. Marvelously illustrated with images of individual pieces and interiors, this excellent book contains 24 essays on the category’s major “designer makers.”

Merrill, who comes from a family of American antiques dealers, deems these midcentury craftsmen to be part of the great tradition of individual expression in cabinetmaking that stretches back to Colonial times and is referred to as Americana. He recognizes four subcategories, beginning with the studio artisans, who turned to furniture making as a way to pursue a life—and a living—in art. The fabled progenitor of this group was Wharton Esherick, whose rustic wood furniture and interiors were influenced by styles as various as Arts & Crafts and Cubism. Distinguishing himself from other woodworkers of his day, he created fl uid and twisting forms respectful of the grain and structure of the tree. A visit to Esherick’s ingenious handcrafted studio in Paoli, Pennsylvania—which is now a museum—became a favorite pilgrimage for succeeding generations of aspiring woodworkers, among them Sam Maloof and Wendell Castle, who are both featured in the book.

Merrill’s next subcategory comprises the designer craftsmen. While they too were artists, they were more ambitious about their output and employed other artisans to help fabricate their designs. Paul Evans and Phillip Lloyd Powell, for example, had a small factory near New Hope, Pennsylvania, where they produced flamboyant, richly ornamented furnishings out of exotic woods and patinated metals. The legendary woodworker George Nakashima, who fancied himself a “Japanese Shaker,” maintained his workshop nearby. The cosmopolitan Vladimir Kagan, however, preferred midtown Manhattan, where he set up a shop featuring his own biomorphic furniture along with contemporary art, ceramics and textiles by a select group of artists. One of them was Louise Nevelson, who often used wood scraps from Kagan’s factory in her sculptures.

A third subcategory encompasses the custom designers, typically interior designers with high-end furniture- making businesses. The father-and-son team of Philip and Kelvin LaVerne, working in New York, produced gorgeous etched-pewter and cast-bronze art furniture that drew on modern, Old World and Chinese traditions. As entrepreneurial as they were artistic, the LaVernes published a catalogue of their designs for clients and fashioned extraordinary one-of-a-kind furnishings for such collectors as Aristotle Onassis. In a class all his own was the roguish James Mont, whose sumptuous designs, executed using the costliest materials and most expensive finishes, teetered between the grand and the grandiose. Not surprisingly, perhaps, his furnishings were avidly collected not just by wealthy sophisticates but also by high-rolling mobsters, who often backed his projects.

Last but not least, Merrill describes the decorator-designers who specialized in creating total environments. Instead of operating their own workshops, they collaborated with small networks of local craftsmen and furniture makers. This more tenuous connection with their craft did not hinder them from realizing highly original furnishings and interiors. The silent-movie star turned decorator William Haines almost single-handedly invented the Hollywood Regency style through his assemblages of bespoke furniture, antiques and interior treatments for Joan Crawford and other film celebrities. Paul László, a Hungarian refugee, was one of the major forces behind California modernism, with its simple, soft lines, deep upholstery, audacious colors and rich textures.

Since money is what makes markets, these essays often include recent prices. At Design Miami 2007, for example, Reform Gallery, which had long championed Blunk’s work, sold a table of his for $250,000. Also last year, the Bathers Cabinet, a unique work by the LaVernes, fetched $91,000 at Sotheby’s. For serious collectors of midcentury American design, this information, along with the book’s finely drawn profiles, make Modern Americana a must-have. "Design, Redefined" originally appeared in the October 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's October 2008 Table of Contents.