Michael Graves Big Dripper Ceramic Coffee Pot for Swid Powell

Details

Description

Michael Graves Big Dripper Porcelain Drip Coffee Pot for Swid Powell, Post-Modern Design
Designed for Swid Powell, New York; made … Read more Michael Graves Big Dripper Porcelain Drip Coffee Pot for Swid Powell, Post-Modern Design
Designed for Swid Powell, New York; made in Japan, Circa 1987

This is a complete example of the Big Dripper, Michael Graves's Post-Modern coffee pot designed for Swid Powell around 1987: a white porcelain sphere banded with three wavy blue-green lines, a triangular spout, a circular loop handle, a cover with gold ball knob, a conical filter section for pour-over brewing with gilt rim and ring handle, and the signature terracotta-red X-form stand. The underside of the stand carries the printed Swid Powell mark with Graves's facsimile signature and the name The Big Dripper; the filter section is marked © Swid Powell with its original Made in Japan label. Fourteen-cup capacity. The design is held in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, the RISD Museum and the Yale University Art Gallery, and its companion Little Dripper is in Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

Swid Powell, founded in 1982 by Nan Swid and Addie Powell, commissioned tableware from the leading architects of the 1980s, and Graves — designer of the Alessi whistling-bird kettle and the Portland Building — was its best seller. The Big Dripper brings that era's wit straight to the table: it works as a functional pour-over coffee maker and holds its own as sculpture on open shelving, a kitchen counter or a bar cart.

Dimensions
Height: 8¾ inches (22.2 cm)
Width: 10¾ inches (27.3 cm)
Depth: 6¾ inches (17.1 cm)
Height with the filter section in place: 11¼ inches (28.6 cm)

Condition
Excellent, retaining the bright gold finish to the knob and filter rim and the clean lines of the enamel decoration.

(Ref: NY10606-irax) See less