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Hugo Junkers - Engineer, aviation pioneer and visionary

Hugo Junkers can be described as an extremely versatile pioneer. Born Feburary the 3rd in 1859 in Rheydt, he was a German entrepreneur, engineer, researcher and professor at the same time and the creator of the first all-metal airplane in history.

The model, called the Junkers J1 was built in 1915. The bodyshell of this type was still made of steel. The following airplanes were planked with light metal due to weight reasons. Moreover Junkers invented the corrugated structure in the aircraft industry.

Hugo Junkers founded his company Junkers & Co in Dessau in 1895, where he was producing gasappartes. His passion, however, was the aircraft, so he began to focus on this topic from that time on. His work was unique in the 1920s and renowned for its technical innovation.

The nonfiction book „JUNKERS DESSAU - photography and commercial art“ (JUNKERS DESSAU - Fotografie und Werbegrafik) from Steidl publishing deals with the work of the developer. It includes valuable documents and photos from the times of the „Junkers works“ (Junkers Werke). The works were occupied by the German armaments industry in 1933 and destroyed in the 1945.

His constructions can be seen in the Museum of Technology in Dessau. Dedicated fans have made it to their task to restore the old aircraft by Hugo Junkers in laborious work. The members of the Förderverein Technikmuseum „Hugo Junkers“ Dessau e.V. assisted to build the Museum of Technology, which is the most visited museum in Dessau. There is also a pattern of a metal-house designed by Junkers being inspired by the Bauhaus architecture.

Junkers was known for working closely together with artists and intellectuals, also from the Bauhaus in Dessau. From a cooperative work in 1925 with the designer and architect Marcel Breuer arised some of the now so famous tubular steel furniture.

Marcel Breuer was the inventor of the modern furniture type, in whose construction he fell back on the know-how of the expert in steel Hugo Junkers. From the collaboration emerged many of today's distinctive tubular steel furniture. The first of this series is the tubular steel chair B5. There followed various stool and sidetables. The steel club chair B3 is the most famous furniture from this second development phase of the furniture line. The chair got its name "Wassily" later in the 1960s.

Breuer`s major intention in the design of its steel furniture was to not hide
the connection of the alike elements. With striking bolted connections the building technique was purposely made visible.