Wrought Iron Lamp by Paul Kiss Muller Frères, France, Art Deco, Circa 1920

Muller Frères was a family-owned glassworks that is best known for its striking designs produced in the Art Deco and Art Nouveau styles. The French company’s chandeliers, vases, lamps and other glass pieces created in the latter style — which were largely characterized by elegantly crafted natural-world motifs and subtle, organic forms — are highly sought after and make for distinctive additions to any space.

Henri Muller opened the company with four of his brothers in Lunéville, during a time that saw the modernizing Art Nouveau movement in the decorative arts develop countrywide as well as in Britain. It quickly became a dominant aesthetic style in Western Europe and the United States. Muller’s sister and an additional three brothers later joined the business.

The Muller family custom-ordered glass blanks from a glassworks near Nancy. The brothers learned about glass design from Émile Gallé, an innovative pioneer in glass artistry who would become a leading light of Art Nouveau. The style, which spanned furniture, architecture, jewelry and graphic design — can be easily identified by its lush, flowing forms suggested by flowers and plants, as well as the lissome tendrils of sea life. The earliest works by Muller Frères, which were often crafted in cameo glass, are strongly demonstrative of Gallé’s style and influence. 

After a period that saw a pause in production owing to World War I, the company saw considerable success.

Muller Frères employed several hundred people at its commercial peak, when the Art Deco style of the 1920s, which was brought to international attention at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris, was popularized by the likes of René Lalique, Émile-Jacques Ruhlmann and Jules Leleu. Authentic Muller Frères Art Deco sconces and pendants and hanging lamps featured sculptural wrought iron frames and saw an integration of high-polished nickel plating, bronze, frosted glass and silver leaf. 

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Paul Kiss helped elevate metalwork to an art form in the 1920s and 1930s, creating beautiful Art Deco-inspired furniture like table lamps and wall mirrors with exquisite ornate details. The pieces often featured geometric designs, plant motifs and human and animal figures.

Kiss was born in Hungary in 1885, but he settled in Paris in 1907. There, he worked under Raymond Subes and Edgar Brandt, two of the most celebrated metalworkers of the day. After World War I, Kiss opened his own studio and showroom on the city’s rue Léon-Delhomme. Kiss designed and produced numerous pieces of iron furniture throughout the 1920s and 1930s. He was commissioned to restore historic monuments and make new public monuments as well. Among his clients were the kings of Siam and Egypt.

Kiss produced the metalwork for the Monuments aux Morts war memorial in Levallois-Perret, France, for which he received the silver medal at the Salon des Artistes Français in 1924. In 1925, he exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Décorateurs and the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes.

In the 1920s, Kiss was a mentor to the skilled young designer Paul Fehér. Fehér later moved to the United States, where he became a distinguished designer for Rose Iron Works, continuing the tradition handed down to him by Kiss.

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