In 1950, Russel Wright designed a line of furniture for the Statton Furniture Manufacturing Company of Hagerstown Maryland. It was made of solid sycamore wood, and came in a "blond" finish known as "Golden Griege".
It was not, apparently, a commercial success, and was sold in very small quantities. But some was sold, and I grew up with it (along with some very worn out American Modern pottery in chartreuse). Since there's a relative lack of information about the Statton Modern, I figured it would be useful to put up a page with some information and photographs.
My parents bought these pieces in 1951, from a furniture store in Pittsburgh, PA. My mother remembers that it took a long time to be delivered, I presume that they were building it to order.
(This furniture is not for sale. However, any price data is welcome.)
This is the famous signature piece of the line. One side is a drop leaf table, the other side is a magazine rack. Both sides fold in flat.
Please note that this chair has been refinished! (A modern clear coat finish over Minwax "Natural" stain.) It is not very close to the original finish, which is quite hard to duplicate. The original finish was rather opaque, it's halfway between a paint and a stain. This finish does do a much better job of showing the beauty of the sycamore wood.
The chair has also been reupholstered. The original fabric was a predominantly black tweed, with off-white, golden yellow, and brick red threads woven in:
This presumably one of the fabrics Wright designed for the Lumite Division of Chicopee Manufacturing for the Statton line. It is the same fabric as is on the chair that was displayed in the exhibit Russel Wright: Creating American Lifestyle at the Smithsonian's Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum in New York. (However, that sample is more faded.)
Here are two pieces in the original Golden Greige finish. I've tried to balance the color to get a decent representation of the finish color. (I set my monitors to 6500°K, it may well look too blue if your monitor is at 9500°K.)
The semi-opaque finish comes out a uniform color on the different planks of sycamore, which is not the case with the stain used in refinishing the chair. Some boards are quarter-sawn, and others aren't, so they will not stain to a uniform color.
Some of the green cast to the finish is due to the aging of the nitrocellulose lacquer used on these pieces. This green cast is not original.
The chair (one of four) has been reupholstered. It was originally in a similar plaid, but in brick red and dark gold.
The table is heavy. It also has wobbly legs, which is inherent in Wright's design. Many of these pieces were designed without full consideration of the structural realities of building wooden furniture.
Two of these chairs were loaned to the Cooper Hewitt exhibition.
These are the other pieces in the family. I don't currently have a publishable photograph of these two.
This was also purchased in 1951. It has not survived. Perhaps I'll find a picture of it in a photo album someday.
On page 83 of Hennessey's Russel Wright American Designer, picture number 50 is of Wright's East 48th Street townhouse. This picture is full of Statton Modern. (Which probably means that the photo dates later than the estimate of 1949.) In the left foreground is the No. 5046 Television Chair, on the right is the No. 5106 Loveseat. Mary is leaning over the No. 5574 Drop Leaf Service Cart. The table and chairs in the background are not Statton Modern.
I think that the photograph on the lower left corner of page 96 of Kerr's Collector's Encyclopedia of Russel Wright is not on the right page. I think it's Heywood-Wakefield. The other photos are clearly from Statton's sales literature.
The photo on page 74 is clearly of Statton Modern furniture, but some of the peices must be later designs. On the very left is the No. 5319 Base Cabinet and No. 5409 Top Cabinet. The center table is the No. 5534 Stacking Table. To the right of the TV cabinet is the No. 5504 Coffee Table. But the chairs and couch aren't shown in the information I have. They're much more sprightly than the earlier designs, I really like them.
Note that the pictures of Fairmount Lamps on pages 105 and 106 use Statton Modern furniture as a backdrop, mostly the Drop Leaf Chair. (Someone screwed in the seat unit awfully reclined!)
John Shriver
March 2, 2002