Peder Pedersen or P.A. Pedersen?  

Fast forward to a few weeks ago, and this same desk design pops up on local craigslist. During initial searches last summer, I could find no other examples, and now two pop in Chicago within the same year. The craigslist one did not have recessed handles like the summer auction one, and the pulls appeared to be replacements compared with the DFI photo. What caught my eye was a closeup photo of the dovetail joints, which indicated that they were handmade, not machine-made.

Since the asking price was reasonable*, I decided to do some more searching for info. After a little while, I was able to turn up two archived auction lots from Bruun-Rasmussen for this desk. The listings had enough photos to match up with the craigslist ad, except for the pulls which look conical-shaped, teak for one and rosewood for the other. One of the desks appears to have rosewood veneer for the drop face much like the DFI photo. BR attributed the desks to KL as the designer, like the DFI, but they cited Fredericia Stolefabrik as the manufacturer (side note: see leif

This is where leif gets actively involved. While I previously said that the craigslist asking price was reasonable*, there wasn

more photos, plus confirmation that the oak pulls were replacements. . .

At this stage, I thought I had a Kofod-Larsen desk by Peder Pedersen. I sent a note to the DFI staff that night with a request if they could send me a copy of the Mobilia 1956 ad for my records. They were very prompt and helpful with a reply the next day that included the ad.

Sure enough, the desk was designed by Kofod-Larsen for P.A. Pedersen. Hmmmmm . . . . I didn

Next step: Who was P.A. Pedersen?

This is where leif takes the baton once again. Demonstrating research strategies that put me to shame, he quickly came across the following websites that start to paint a pretty clear picture of P.A.

1) Adding Brande to his searches turned up some P.A. Pedersen ads in a local Brande Christmas publication. He placed similar ads here almost every year during this era. While no pieces were included in the ad, it did include the address of the shop:

Storegade 68, Brande

https://issuu.com/brandehistorie/docs/brandejul-1963 (pg 34)

2) A brilliant next step was to Google map the address, then do a street view. Could you ask for a better result than this? Not only is the building still there, but it still has

As a side note, I had always translated the term

So who was P.A. Pedersen?

Based on all of the above, my conclusions are that Peder Anton Pedersen was a snedker in Brande, who inherited the snedkerhuset and snedkerv

Oh, and on a slight tangent note, while doing the research for this desk, I happened to ID a coffee table that had been listed for a while without being sold. It just so happens that this coffee table is designed by Kofod-Larsen, and made by none other than P.A. Pedersen. It is the same table that is shown in the ad on the Danish Modern UK site.

It is still in transit and should arrive in a couple of weeks.

Nice write up. Yet another mystery of conflated identities has been cleared up.

I kind of like how Bruun-Rasmussen made a double error in those listings: they knew that Kofod Larsen designed for "Fredericia" and so they decided to give maker credit to "Fredericia" for the secretary, but they did not realize that there were two "Fredericias" and so when they got around to putting the full name in the listing they put in "Fredericia Stolefabrik." Double error.

I do wonder if there is some connection between Kofod Larsen and the town of Brande...?