Rare Jules Wabbes Executive Corner Desk in Wengé

Jules Wabbes, writing desk with drawer compartments, wengé, metal, lacquered wood, Belgium, 1960s.

This corner desk is designed by Jules Wabbes. The table is executed with a solid wengé wooden top, made of tangentially-sawn wengé slats. The geometric base compliments this material and construction-based approach perfectly. The construction and joints are visible and the desk has a clear constructive composition. Nothing is hidden, everything can and should be seen. Because of this finish, this design can be used free-standing in space, like a tactical sculpture, with the same attention and precision given to the execution of back and front, top and bottom. Thanks to this, and to the use of solid wengé, its honest and clear design and perfectionist finish defy time in an unparalleled manner.

Jules Wabbes (1919-1974) was one of the leading Belgian furniture designers and interior architects of the Postwar period. Born in Brussels in 1919, he began his career as an actor. However, after several other professions, he eventually started to become interested in antiques. When Wabbes was 24, he opened an antiques shop where some of the furniture needed restoration. Therefore, he created a small workshop where he taught himself how to restore furniture. Therefore, in contrast to many of his contemporaries, he wasn't trained as a designer or architect but learned the craft of designing furniture by sheer necessity. Alongside restoration, he also started to design furniture. Because of the success of his ventures, it led to Wabbes designing many interiors for his clients. In 1971, Wabbes became professor at the Sint-Lucasinstituut in Brussels. Unfortunately, Wabbes died at an early age in 1974 due to cancer.

Overall, his work is aristocratic and modest, and characterized by a sensual use of materials and a clear, almost architectural tectonics. Wabbes developed a line and idiom of its own, averse to the playful and swinging style of many other furniture designs of the Postwar period. Wabbes, influenced by American designers such as Edward Wormley, chose to build his furniture with solid wood giving his designs not only a luxurious appearance but also honest, timeless and sophisticated aesthetics.

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