RUSSEL WRIGHT (1904 - 1976) was an industrial designer who transformed American homes by bringing contemporary design to kitchen tables across the country. Born in Lebanon, Ohio, Wright briefly studied at Princeton Law from 1922-1924. However, after becoming enamored with the Broadway plays in New York, he soon left law school to work in the set design office of Norman Bel Geddes. It was through the theater scene that Wright met his wife, Mary Einstein Wright, whose business acumen would later become a crucial component of the duo's success.

In 1937, Wright designed his iconic American Modern dinnerware sets. This ceramic line came in a variety of soft pastels and earth tones with biomorphic shapes influenced by the surrealist Jean Arp. Thanks to the savvy marketing of Mary Wright, American Modern was a commercial hit so popular that it frequently sold out in stores. George Nelson attributed the designs of Wright as responsible for the American “shift towards the modern in the 1930s”. Wright’s mantra was “good design is for everyone” and in 1949, he created a new dishwasher-safe line. In 1950, the Wrights published their Guide to Easier Living, which laid out how to entertain guests in a suburban home. He began to experiment with the new medium of plastic, and his Flair line of melamine dishes was released in 1959.

In 1965, he retired from designing and moved from NYC to his summer home in Manitoga. The Cooper Hewitt Museum of Design in New York honored Russel Wright with a retrospective of his objects in 2001 and his work is held in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cooper Hewitt Design Museum, among many others.

(Image Credit: Bauer Pottery; Source: Wright Auctions)