Marcel Gascoin

Marcel Gascoin (1907-1986) was a French designer best remembered for his important role in renewing the French design scene in the post-war period. A significant part of his work consisted in particular of modular wooden furniture, prefiguring a design trend that would become increasingly popular in the second half of the twentieth century. Born in Le Havre into a family of sailors, Gascoin was very familiar with boat interiors from an early age and from there drew the inspiring principles of his design, including the use of retractable systems that made it possible to optimise the limited space in cabins and which he also transferred to the domestic sphere. Trained as a cabinetmaker and decorator, in the 1930s Gascoin joined the Union des artistes modernes (UAM) at the invitation of its president Robert Mallet-Stevens, although he did not fully adhere to the principles of modernism due to his strong ties with the artisan tradition and with a natural material of the past such as wood. It was in the years of reconstruction immediately following the Second World War that Gascoin achieved great prominence: his idea of a democratic design, intended for mass production at affordable prices, was embraced in that period by the political authorities who needed to relaunch production in large numbers to deal with the destruction left by the war. In those years Gascoin became a consultant to the ministers in charge of supervising the reconstruction of the country and coordinated several initiatives aimed at facilitating designers' access to mass production, which was totally new to the French furniture industry at the time, gathering around him some of the most talented young designers of the time including Pierre Guariche, Joseph-André Motte, Pierre Paulin and many others. The late 1940s and early 1950s were his period of maximum creative intensity: it was then that many of his most famous furnishings saw the light, re-proposed in recent years by the Scandinavian brand Gubi. Dissatisfied with the level of collaboration found in companies, Gascoin also founded his own brand, Comera (COmpagnie des MEubles Rationnels), which soon specialized in the production of modular kitchens and is still active today.