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Georg Jensen Takes Danish Design to the Next Level
April 2009
Georg Jensen Takes Danish Design to the Next Level
Scandinavian luxury lifestyle brand Georg Jensen has appointed designer Todd Bracher Creative Director of the brand and head of a new creative force consisting of the Georg Jensen internal design team, the Georg Jensen designer network and Copenhagen based design consultants OeO.
April 30, 2009 – Today Georg Jensen announced that Todd Bracher will take the reins at Georg Jensen as Creative Director, responsible for the full range of Georg Jensen products from jewellery and watches to flatware and hollowware. Todd Bracher will take up his new position on May 1st. Together with Georg Jensen’s in-house product development team and Georg Jensen’s unique designer network, Bracher and OeO will energize and align the future design and brand vision.
As part of the new strategy Todd Bracher will be working together with his long-time partner Thomas Lykke and Anne-Marie Buemann from OeO, a Danish based, and strategy-driven design company with vast experience from the design industry. The new set-up allows Georg Jensen to unite the best of today’s Danish and international design competencies with a strong strategic and commercial approach to new product introductions.
“I am thrilled and honoured to be joining Georg Jensen. To be part of this brand and to help sculpt its vision has been a long-term dream for me. Georg Jensen has a specific language and intelligence, it communicates on so many levels. The possibilities are endless and we intend to explore them”, Todd Bracher says.
The appointment of Todd Bracher is part of the strategy that CEO Ulrik Garde Due introduced when he joined the company from British top fashion label Burberry last year. A strategy, which is turning the traditional Danish Silversmith into a Scandinavian luxury lifestyle brand with an integrated product range.
“Todd Bracher was an obvious choice for the position as Creative Director. He is perfectly aware of the brand’s many qualities and appreciates the craftsmanship and the unique sense of style. Yet, he has a young and fresh approach to continue the creative developments. I am convinced he will be able to take Georg Jensen to the next level”, Ulrik Garde Due says.
Since 1904 Georg Jensen has succeeded in attracting and working with some of the most talented designers around the globe. One of these talented designers is Todd Bracher who has designed for Georg Jensen since 2004 and will now be in charge of identifying and supporting the next generation of design stars, joining such legendary artists as Georg Jensen, Arne Jacobsen and Henning Koppel.
When, back in 1999, Todd moved to Denmark to study in Copenhagen at the Danish Design School he soon became fascinated by the Danish design tradition and shortly after launched his own beautiful sculptural furniture and home accessories for Danish and international companies such as Fritz Hansen and Zanotta.
“The works of Georg Jensen himself, Henning Koppel and Arne Jacobsen have shaped who I am as a designer and are the very reason why I eventually moved to Denmark to look ‘behind the scenes’ at the source of these works. I discovered that the forms of the Georg Jensen collection capture the generosity and elegance that is built into the Danes and their way of life”, says Todd, who, at Georg Jensen, will be defining the brand’s future design philosophy.
“Design is much more than creating forms and shapes. It is about the heart and mind that has produced it. For us to maintain brand coherence we must define what the heart must feel and the mind think and the rest will follow”, Todd Bracher says.
Critics might argue that asking a foreigner to take the Georg Jensen design language into the future is not the obvious thing to do. That it would take a native Dane to understand the true essence of Georg Jensen – the tradition, the story and the role the Silversmithy has played in creating the term Danish Design.
“The heritage is huge and the responsibility is vast. Part of Todd’s training was here in Copenhagen, which mixed with his international experience allows us to get an external point of view of Danish design with an internal understanding. For me it is bringing in the right person who in his soul understands where Georg Jensen is coming from and who has the skills, the courage and the ability to bring Georg Jensen and Danish design into the next century. To me Todd Bracher is that person,” Ulrik Garde Due states.
Ulrik Garde Due, CEO Todd Bracher, Creative Director