T.H. Robsjohn-Gibbings

Terence Harold Robsjohn-Gibbings (1905–1976) was an architect, decorator, furniture designer, tastemaker and thinker whose innovative ideas on furniture and interior design during the postwar era had a formative impact on the decorative arts in the United States and beyond. Rooted in Greco-Roman sensibilities, classical principles, and early American domestic culture, he developed a unique style removed from mass-production and sterile modernism, to create a genuine and eclectic American modernism.

Born in England, Robsjohn-Gibbings worked various jobs throughout the 1920s, first as a naval architect, designing ocean liner interiors, then as an art director for a motion picture studio as well as a salesman for an antique dealer, before taking up residence in New York in 1930. By the late 1930s and early 1940s, he had become one the most important decorators in America. After opening a shop on New York's Madison Avenue in 1936, Robsjohn-Gibbings proceeded to design houses from coast to coast for such patrons as tobacco heiress Doris Duke, publisher Alfred A. Knopf, and socialite Thelma Chrysler Foy.

Robsjohn-Gibbings' best known commission was Hilda Boldt Weber's mansion Casa Encantada in Bel-Air, for which he created more than 200 pieces of furniture between 1934 and 1938, which heavily drew from ancient Greek designs. His unique style was widely emulated and enabled him, from 1943 to 1956, to design furniture for the Widdicomb Furniture Company in Grand Rapids, Michigan. In 1960, he met Greek cabinetmakers Susan and Eleftherios Saridis, and, together, they created the “Klismos” line of furniture, which drew heavily on classical forms and is still in production to this day. Robsjohn-Gibbings eventually moved to Athens where he passed away in 1976.