The Schmitz-Horning Co. Featured in Architect Magazine

By Janet Dodrill

Architect Magazine published an article online June 6, 2019, titled Wallpaper Motifs of the 20th Century. In the article, the Building Technology Heritage Library (BTHL) highlights 11 pioneers in the evolution of 20th century wallpaper styles and motifs.

Online viewable catalogs are embedded in the article. A scanned original Schmitz-Horning Co. 1920 San-Kro-Mura Wall Decorations full catalog is included, showing printed wallpaper panels and murals with themes including medieval tapestries, modern tiles, and floral motifs, and more.

It is evident that the diversity and skill of Cleveland’s Schmitz-Horning’s staff artists helped the company to create a beautiful variety of murals and scenic designs produced onto high quality washable and affordable chromolithographs.

Links:

Architect Magazine, Wallpaper Motifs of the 20th Century, June 6, 2019
https://www.architectmagazine.com/practice/wallpaper-motifs-of-the-20th-century_o

Schmitz-Horning Co 1920 San-Kro-Mura Wall Decorations catalog
https://archive.org/details/San-kro-muraWallDecorations

 

 

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Chinese Embroidery wall mural pattern from the San-Kro-Mura Wall Decorations catalog.

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Chinese Floral wall decoration pattern from the San-Kro-Mura Wall Decorations catalog.

Schmitz-Horning Company’s The Nymph wall mural pattern from the San-Kro-Mura Wall Decorations catalog.

Copyright article and images. All rights reserved. Not to be used without permission.

Carl Fuchs Designed Schmitz-Horning Scenic Wall Pattern

By Janet Dodrill

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Old South 1930s-1940s scenic panel detail (Photo: Cooper Hewitt).

Carl Fuchs designed the Old South scenic wall paper pattern (1930s-1940s) for the Schmitz-Horning Company of Cleveland, Ohio. The color lithograph (chromolithograph) inks and (washable) paper used were of the highest quality. Old South depicted plantation life in early America, and included a steamboat and fox hunt. There were twelve sections, each approximately 40″ x 80″ in repeat pattern.

The company was co-founded and run by my great-grandfather, Hugo M. Schmitz, and after his death in the late 1930s, run by my grandfather Warren R. Schmitz.

I am almost certain this 1920s Art Deco decorative pattern, Dekorative Vorbilder (Decorative Role Models), which I came across on an auction site, is by the same artist.

Dekorative Vorbilder by Carl Fuchs, 1920s Art Deco decorative pattern (Photo: Liveauctioneers.com).

Carl Fuchs was also hired by my grandparents to paint an oil portrait of my mother, then a girl of eight years.

Oil portrait of Schmitz-Horning president’s daughter (my mother) by artist Carl Fuchs, 1939 (Photo: Schmitz family).

Resources:

Cooper Hewitt, Old South Scenic Panels
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431473/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431471/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431469/

Cooper Hewitt, Objects Involving The Schmitz-Horning Co.
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/people/18046573/objects/

Riverview Estate Auctions, September 27, 2015 Auction, Lot 0008B
https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/41129637_1920s-art-deco-dekorative-vorbilder-print-carl-fuchs

Copyright article and images. All rights reserved. Not to be used without permission.

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Old South scenic panel, 1 of 12 sections, each 40″ x 80″, repeat, designed by Carl Fuchs (Photo: Cooper Hewitt).

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Old South scenic panel, 1 of 12 sections, each 40″ x 80″, repeat, designed by Carl Fuchs (Photo: Cooper Hewitt).

Schmitz-Horning Company’s Old South scenic panel, 1 of 12 sections, each 40″ x 80″, repeat, designed by Carl Fuchs (Photo: Cooper Hewitt).

Glenn M. Shaw, Established Mural Artist Designed for Schmitz-Horning Co.

By Janet Dodrill

The Old Canal by Glenn M. Shaw, small-scale salesman sample, chromolithograph, 4-panel pattern.

The Old Canal detail.

Glenn Moore Shaw was a local Northeast Ohio commercial artist, who had a studio in Lakewood, Ohio, and he designed a number of patterns for the Schmitz-Horning Company, sometime between the 1930s and 1950s. His artist wife Elsa Vick Shaw also designed for the company. Both had a friendly and close working relationship for a number of years with my grandfather, Warren Reynolds Schmitz, who ran Schmitz-Horning from 1938 to 1960.

The scenic designs included five illustrated maps (which were said to be accurate), The Old Canal (or Canal Days) wallpaper or wall mural pattern set which depicts the Ohio & Erie Canal between Cleveland and Bath, Ohio, and Old Dominion wall mural pattern which was a set of seven panels. Each panel in the Old Dominion pattern was 30” x 80” plus, printed in multi-color chromolithograph, to be trimmed at the desired height.

Old Dominion by Glenn M. Shaw, chromolithograph, 7-panel pattern, each 30″ x 80″+.

Old Dominion detail.

Shown is a section of the pictorial map Glenn Shaw designed called Robinson Crusoe, which is part of a collection of Schmitz-Horning wall coverings at the Smithsonian’s Cooper Hewitt Design Museum (a gift from the Wallpaper Council, Inc.).

In addition to professional fine art painting and printmaking, he taught mural painting and advertising design at the Cleveland School of Art for 35 years, and painted murals in three post offices, Canton, Warren, and Perrysburg, Ohio.

Robinson Crusoe Pictoral Mural Map, one panel 40″ x 60″, designed by Glenn M. Shaw. Above catalog illustration, below section of actual paper (photo: Cooper Hewitt).

Resources:

Schmitz family documents

Wikipedia

Ohio Post Office Artwork Collection
http://www.wpamurals.com/ohiopoart.htm
http://www.wpamurals.com/ohio.htm

AskArt
http://www.askart.com/artist/Glenn_Moore_Shaw/109732/Glenn_Moore_Shaw.aspx

Elsa Vick Shaw, The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
http://ech.case.edu/cgi/article.pl?id=SEV

Glenn Moore Shaw, The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History
http://ech.case.edu/cgi/article.pl?id=SGM

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum Links:

Smuggler’s Cove, Scenic Mural/Map Panel, 1950 (by Glenn M. Shaw)
http://www.cooperhewitt.org/2015/07/05/decorative-wall-map/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431523/with-image-6098/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431521/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431523/with-image-91433/

Pioneer America, Scenic Mural/Map Panel, 1930–40 (by Glenn M. Shaw)
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431531/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431533/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431533/with-image-95057/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431533/with-image-95920/
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431533/with-image-95056/

Robinson Crusoe, Scenic Mural/Map Panel, 1930-40 (by Glenn M. Shaw)
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431521/

Spanish Main, Scenic Mural/Map Panel, 1930-40 (by Glenn M. Shaw)
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431535/

Relief Map of the United States, Scenic Mural/Map Panel, 1930-40 (by Glenn M. Shaw)
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431525/

Image from Cooperhewitt.org used under the Fair Use copyright act.

Copyright article and images. All rights reserved. Not to be used without permission.

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Cooper Hewitt Museum at Smithsonian Offers Large Sample Collection of Schmitz-Horning Wallcoverings

By Janet Dodrill

For design and wallpaper lovers, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian’s Design Museum, has an entire section of wall covering samples from the Schmitz-Horning Company of Cleveland, Ohio. As a gift of the Wallpaper Council, Inc., the collection has dozens of patterns and color variations, printed as chromo-lithographs, mostly believed to be from the 1930s and 1940s.

Scenic Hudson, Scenic-Panels by Schmitz-Horning Co., 1930-1940, Cooper Hewitt, Gift of Scott Cazet

The company was known for upscale lithographic wallpaper, friezes, art murals, and scenic panoramics, printed with oil-based inks onto high-quality paper, and was in business between 1905 and 1960. They used some of the largest zinc printing plates in the country, with an image area of roughly 80″ x 40″. The paper was fully washable.

The design museum owns one full set, a four-part scenic mural called ‘Scenic Hudson,’ a lovely pattern that they describe, “captures a romantic view of the Hudson River.” What’s also great is that Cooper Hewitt includes a detailed description of the work with accompanying audio. This set was the gift of Scott Cazet.

Additionally, Schmitz-Horning offered a selection of large-scale wall maps. The Cooper Hewitt museum has two adjoining sections of a beautifully illustrated map, ‘Smuggler’s Cove,’ designed by established Cleveland area artist Glenn M. Shaw, who contracted on several designs with the company. Again, the museum offers details and audio on the pattern.

Smuggler’s Cove by Schmitz-Horning Co., 1930-1940, Cooper Hewitt, Gift of Wallpaper Council, Inc.

Although the museum is still in the process of digitizing the samples to post on their website, I have created a category on my Pinterest page of Schmitz-Horning work currently on their site. I have a special interest in the history, since my great-grandfather, Hugo M. Schmitz, co-founded and served as president of the company, until his death, when it was then operated by my grandfather, Warren R. Schmitz. I am thrilled that these samples were preserved and thanks to the digital age they are now being shared.

Cooper Hewitt has undertaken a huge (ongoing) effort to make the Schmitz-Horning Co. samples available as resources for the general public, researchers, and enthusiasts.

Resource Links:

Cooper Hewitt / The Schmitz-Horning Co.
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/people/18046573/

Cooper Hewitt / Schmitz Horning / Objects Of The Day
http://www.cooperhewitt.org/tag/schmitz-horning/

(Pictured) Chinese Embroidery Scenic-Panel by Schmitz-Horning Co., 1930-1940, Cooper Hewitt, Gift of Wallpaper Council, Inc.
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18431485/

Chinese Embroidery Scenic-Panel by Schmitz-Horning Co., 1930-1940, Cooper Hewitt, Gift of Wallpaper Council, Inc.

 

Images from Cooperhewitt.org used under the Fair Use copyright act.