Download our app and ask your own questions during your visit. Here are some that others have asked.

Who would have used this? Was it sold commercially?

While we don't have any information on previous owners, we do know that it was made during the machine age (i.e. mass produced) by the Lloyd Manufacturing company, so yes, it would have been sold commercially.

How much do you think it cost?

I am finding that most of Weber’s chairs and other pieces for Lloyd were priced in the $20 to $140 range, making them accessible to the broad middle-class market.

Why is Kem Weber's Vanity with Mirror and Stool identified as gender specific?

Great question! Historically, vanities were part of a grouping of furniture found in the boudoir, an elite female-gendered space in the eighteenth century. By the 1930s, the dressing table had become a common component of a bedroom set for girls and women at all social levels. As the name implies, “vanities” were associated with superficiality and preoccupation with appearances. At this time, the interest in decoration and beauty was thought to be within the exclusive purview of women; makeup was marketed with increasing force and “putting on one’s face” was a common activity. In 1933, the Vogue Book of Beauty stated that, “A dose of new beauty acts just like a cocktail, breaking down inhibition and putting new fun into life.”

Tell me more.

Kem Weber was a German-born furniture designer who moved to California in 1915 and became a leader in modern American design. The vanity was made by the Lloyd Manufacturing Company, which opened in 1906 in Menominee, Michigan.

Why is the palette so minimalistic?

This is unlike some earlier vanities that might be wood or glass and incorporate painted details or other decoration. This was called the "Machine Aesthetic." It was believed to point the way to a productive and efficient future where everything would be streamlined (literally and figuratively) for maximum effect! Chrome was used for automobiles first, because it does not rust. And then it was incorporated into home decor! This was a futuristic style when it first began.

Tell me more.

This is a dressing table. By the 1930s, the dressing table had become a common component of a bedroom set for girls and women at all social levels. Historically, vanities had been part of a furniture group found in the boudoir, a private female space only found in more elite homes.

Are these materials (wood, metal, glass, et cetera) considered gender specific?

In this case, the focus on lightweight tubular steel was more because it was easy to clean and cheap to manufacture. It capitalized on the machine aesthetic that was popular at the time. The gendering of this furniture has more to do with its function as a vanity where one might sit to apply make-up or style your hair; activities primarily associated with women in the 1930s.

I really like the mirror and how its connected only on one side!

That asymmetry was considered especially modern. The materials are also modern. Chrome had been used in automobile production but it was something new for home design! The shapes of the table and stool are very "streamlined." There's no ornament or texture, just lots of long lines and smooth surfaces with rounded edges. In the 1930s the "machine aesthetic" was a crossover from industry...seeing the beauty in mechanical forms and introducing it into other parts of life (not just industry).

For the vanity, what was so appealing about it?

It was made in the Art Deco style of the time, featuring sleek, black and silver design elements and streamlined forms. The vanity was also popular at this time among women of various social classes, not just wealthy women as they had previously been. At this time, makeup was being marketed with increasing force to women, so they began to dedicate a piece of furniture to their cosmetic ritual. Lastly, objects like this could be cheaply mass produced with materials like tubular steel.

Is the Vanity with Mirror and Stool from Ikea?

I wish I could find something like this at Ikea! It was designed by Kem Weber and made by Lloyd Manufacturing Company in 1934, 9 years before Ikea was founded!

Stool

Decorative Arts and Design

On View: American Art Galleries, 5th Floor, Counterparts

Aerodynamic streamlining is characteristic of much American industrial and domestic design of the late 1920s and 1930s. Undecorated, curved designs, as seen here, are well suited to machine production and expressive of speed and change. The vanity and stool are made of chromed metal tubing, an innovation in furniture construction pioneered in the early 1920s by Marcel Breuer at the Bauhaus, the seminal German school for modern design. It was still a startling new material a decade later.

Although the vanity is gender-specific, this stark, modern interpretation has a limited palette and is made of new materials with hard surfaces. Updating an old form, Kem Weber transformed it for the modern woman.

DESIGNER Kem Weber, American, born Germany, 1889–1963

MANUFACTURER Lloyd Manufacturing Company, Menominee, Michigan, 1906–1921

MEDIUM Chrome-plated tubular steel, upholstery

Place Manufactured: Menominee, Michigan, United States

DATES ca. 1934

DIMENSIONS 17 1/2 x 21 x 22 1/2 in. (44.5 x 53.3 x 57.2 cm)

COLLECTIONS Decorative Arts and Design

ACCESSION NUMBER 87.123.2

CREDIT LINE Modernism Benefit Fund

PROVENANCE Prior to 1987, provenance not yet documented; by 1987, acquired by Dyan Economakos, Palos Heights, IL;1987, purchased from Dyan Economakos by the Brooklyn Museum.

Provenance FAQ

CATALOGUE DESCRIPTION Low, four-legged stool, en suite with vanity and mirror (87.123.1a-b). Half an oval in plan, consisting of tubular steel legs and continuous stretchers wrapping around all but front side of stool. Seat is deep (wood-framed?) unit sitting atop legs and covered in black simulated leather.

EXHIBITIONS

MUSEUM LOCATION This item is on view in American Art Galleries, 5th Floor, Counterparts

RECORD COMPLETENESS

Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.

Download our app and ask your own questions during your visit. Here are some that others have asked.

Who would have used this? Was it sold commercially?

How much do you think it cost?

I am finding that most of Weber’s chairs and other pieces for Lloyd were priced in the $20 to $140 range, making them accessible to the broad middle-class market.

Why is Kem Weber's Vanity with Mirror and Stool identified as gender specific?

Tell me more.

Why is the palette so minimalistic?

Tell me more.

Are these materials (wood, metal, glass, et cetera) considered gender specific?

I really like the mirror and how its connected only on one side!

For the vanity, what was so appealing about it?

Is the Vanity with Mirror and Stool from Ikea?

I wish I could find something like this at Ikea! It was designed by Kem Weber and made by Lloyd Manufacturing Company in 1934, 9 years before Ikea was founded!