Rationalisation and upper mounting of operational elements, combination of radio and phono functions, restriction of form to express the technical means of its production – legible particularly in the radiused edges of bent steel and perspex sheeting, and, more negatively, a rejection of the then ruling requirement that domestic audio equipment be embedded a piece of heavy wooden furniture, all of these rightly cement the iconic status of Rams’ and Gugelot’s SK series design.
Arguably, the design succeeds best here in the SK 6 model, where it retains the austere purity of the initial SK 4 and technical advances of the SK 5, whilst dispensing with their incongruously organic fluted tone arm design (an earlier Wagenfeld design for Braun) and avoiding the somewhat fussy detailing of the series’ ultimate incarnation, the SK 55.
Humanitarian in the severe style, rigorous and sympathetic, the SK 6 radiates quality. Recently shown at the London Design Museum Dieter Rams retrospective; the SK 4/5 model of the SK design is held in the permanent collection of the New York Museum of Modern Art.
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