Cylinda-line

Why it is renowned

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London holds pieces of the Cylinda-line, among them a coffee pot with a long, tapering spout and a teapot, made in Copenhagen in 1968 and given by the maker that year.¹² The series won the Danish Design Council's ID Prize right after its launch and has since received several international awards; it has been shown in design museums in many countries.³⁴

Recognition

• Victoria and Albert Museum, London¹1968a Cylinda-line coffee pot, given by Stelton
• Victoria and Albert Museum, London²1968a Cylinda-line teapot, given by Stelton
• Danish Design Council³ID Prize, awarded right after the launch

The story

Peter Holmblad, Arne Jacobsen's stepson and then head of Stelton, asked him in 1964 for a whole series in stainless steel: coffee and tea, and everything for the home bar.⁴³ Jacobsen drew the first teapot on a napkin at a family dinner, while he was finishing St Catherine's College in Oxford.⁴ The idea was to build the pieces from standard steel tubes; that was given up, but the cylinder stayed, and a new production method had to be worked out over three years before the launch in 1967.³⁴ Matt-cut steel and black Bakelite handles set it apart from the shiny, curved shapes then on the market, and the range ran from coffee pot, teapot and jugs to a cocktail shaker, a martini mixer and an ice bucket; early advertising stacked the pieces to look like the Manhattan skyline.⁴³¹