Spotting UFOs

Whilst preparing some listings for my Etsy market, I came across another vase from my collection that is clearly inspired by the space age from the sixties and seventies, just as the Walther Gerhards UFO vase. In fact, this vase also looks a lot like an UFO! This stunning vase, model 179 17, was made by Dümler & Breiden, probably sometime during the 1960s.

Dümler & Breiden UFO vase

Dümler & Breiden were located in Höhr-Grenzhausen, which lies in the famous Westerwald pottery area, and the company existed from 1883 until 1992. They made pottery that ranges from very traditional to more experimental, even though in my opinion, they never were so innovative (especially shape-wise) as companies such as Roth. The shape of this vase must be one of their more exciting and cutting-edge designs, and is very much by the Space Age.

The Space Age influence is not limited to West-German pottery, but it had a lot of influence on design during the 50s and 60s in general . During this era the first manned crews went into space, and we were aiming for the moon. Even though science fiction movies and books inspired the first spacy designs, the Space Age design-craze got a new impulse with Sputnik, the first artificial earth satellite that was launched into an orbit around space in 1957.

Replica of Sputnik 1

 The influence of the space age could be seen everywhere during the fifties and sixties: in architecture (in particular in the famous Googie architecture in the US), in the details of cars, in clothing, and design of televisions and radios, and much, much more. Of course West-German pottery couldn't stay behind! Luckily this resulted in some pretty fun vases, of which this is a great example.

Do you have any cool examples of West-German pottery influenced by the Space Age? Feel free to post them in the comments section, I would love to see them!