Buffets and Cabinets loves to show to our readers everything that is great about craftsmanship, about materials in their rawest forms that truly show the nature of it, Wendel Castle‘s wood cabinets are great examples of it since the artist always preserved and enhanced everything that is great about the arts and crafts, in his furniture design pieces.
Born in Kansas in 1932, Wendell Castle received two degrees from the University of Kansas, one in industrial design in 1958 and the other in sculpture in 1961. He moved to Rochester, New York to teach at the School for American Crafts and established a permanent studio in the area that is still in operation today. He has continually reinvented himself for nearly six decades.
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Often credited as the founding father of the American crafts movement, Castle has redefined sculpture and design by seamlessly merging the two into one discipline. He creates unique pieces that blur the distinction between modern design and sculpture. Castle’s organic and whimsical approach to art sculpture incorporates his own invented technique of carving into stacked laminated wood known as lamination, in his so famous wood cabinets. His furniture designs for residential clients, public spaces, and a number of churches represent a unique exploration of the qualities and possibilities of wood and fiberglass.
His work can be found in the permanent collections of more than forty museums and cultural institutions, including the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the White House in Washington, D.C. Moreover, he has been the recipient of many honors and awards, including four National Endowment for the Arts grants and the Modernism Lifetime Achievement Award from the Brooklyn Museum in 2007.
If you want to take a look at his contemporary design pieces, or his wood cabinets more specifically, you can visit some of the world’s most famous art galleries, such as Carpenters Workshop Gallery, R & Company or Friedman Benda.
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