Raymond Loewy (November 5, 1893 - July 14, 1986) was a noted industrial designer. Born in France, Loewy spent most of his professional career in the United States, where he influenced countless aspects of American life.
Loewy married Jean Thomson in 1931; the marriage would last until 1945. He became a U.S. citizen in 1938. His second marriage, to Viola Erickson, took place in 1948.
Early life
Raymond Loewy was born in Paris and raised in France. An early accomplishment was the design of a successful model aircraft that won the James Gordon Bennett Cup in 1908; by the following year, he was selling the plane, named the Ayrel. He served in the French Army during World War I. He left for the United States in 1919.
Early work
In Loewy's early years in the US, he lived in New York and found work as a window designer for department stores, including Macy's, in addition to working as a fashion illustrator for Vogue and Harper's Bazaar. In 1929, he received his first industrial design commission; to modernize the appearance of a duplicating machine by Gestetner. Further commissions followed, including work for Westinghouse, for the Hupp Motor Works (the Hupmobile styling), and the styling of the Coldspot refrigerator for Sears-Roebuck. His design firm opened a London office in the mid 1930s.
Pennsylvania Railroad
In 1937, Loewy established a relationship with the Pennsylvania Railroad, for which his most notable designs were the streamlined styling of the railroad's passenger locomotives. Loewy designed a streamlined shroud for K4s Pacific #3768 to haul the newly redesigned (by Loewy) 1938 Broadway Limited. He followed this by styling the experimental S1 locomotive, and the T1 class. Later, at the PRR's request, he restyled Baldwin's diesel locomotives, giving them a distinctive "sharknose" snout reminiscent of the T1.
While Loewy did not design the shape of the railroad's famous GG1 electric locomotives, he improved their looks by recommending welded and smoothed, rather than riveted, construction, and a pin-striped paint scheme to highlight their smootly rounded forms.
As well as such glamorous projects, Loewy's studios did all manner of work for the PRR, including designing the interiors of passenger cars, stations, printed material, and much more.
Criticisms
Some criticise Loewy for taking sole credit for designs he was only partly responsible for or had little involvement with.
Although a talented designer and always a major influence in his firm, much of the design work was often done by Loewy's employees, who often get little credit. However, even if true, Loewy is hardly the only example of a credit-hogging figurehead in a design firm.
Sometimes all that Loewy or his firm did was add finishing touches to an existing design; for example, Loewy is generally credited for the styling of the Pennsylvania Railroad's GG1 electric locomotive, but in actual fact the shape had already been devised by the PRR and its subcontractors. Loewy's influence was limited to suggesting that the bodyshell should be welded and smoothed, rather than riveted, and that a paint scheme involving a bundle of five lengthwise gold pinstripes in the center that curved down towards the locomotives' ends would set off the lines well. Those touches arguably turned a good design into a classic design, but the credit cannot be all Loewy's.
As "organic" a designer as Loewy usually was, occasionally functional attributes were subverted in the name of aesthetics. An example of this "Form Fouling Function" occurred with Loewy-Snaith company’s 1968 design of the R40 New York City Subway car, which incorporated a molded fiberglass cap at each end of the twin coupled units. Semi-streamlined, the front and rear faces were angled into the car at 15 degrees from the vertical for what was then a visually dramatic advance over previous utilitarian rolling stock. However, the resulting car had shorter interior dimensions, thereby reducing its seating capacity (a notable flaw when considering mass transit design priorities). It also quickly became apparent that the lack of “flush” connecting cars due to the open, slanted ends presented a falling risk to passengers passing from car to car. The New York City Transit Authority addressed the issue in three steps: Initially, the end doors were permanently locked to prevent egress. Then the R40s were retrofitted with grab bars, safety chains, and very inorganic scissors-action guard gates stretching between the cars; the R40’s dramatic silhouette was significantly diminished. In 1969, for the final 100 of the original 400-car order, a modified non-Loewy R40M became standard, replacing the Loewy angles altogether with a less exciting, more functional design.
Loewy or Loewy-supervised designs
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