National Museum in Warsaw [Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie]

The matching ‘Ina’ and ‘Dorota’ coffee services represent the so-called ‘golden period’ in Polish design history: a time after the political thaw, when designers enjoyed greater creative freedom and the opportunity to create using conventions that were disallowed under socialist realism but popular in the West. These vessels are part of the organic modernism trend, but their highly original, sculptural forms make them stand out from other works in this style. Lubomir Tomaszewski (1923–2018) created them when he was employed at Warsaw’s Institute of Industrial Design (IWP), where he had access to a fully equipped ceramics studio that allowed him to conduct research and experiments in both aesthetics and ergonomics. Although the design was non-traditional and risked rejection from the public, it went into serial production and proved to be successful. The objects shown in this exhibition are prototypes, and their history is closely linked to the 1978 establishment of the design collection at the National Museum in Warsaw. They were part of the IWP’s pattern depot, which became the founding endowment of the design collection and gave it the significant profile that it still enjoys today.