Ole Jorgnesen desk calendar 1973
This calendar was designed by Erik Ole Jorgensen. He was principally a furniture designer, but also designed some smaller objects.
This calendar is a very pleasing object. It has a 1970s' feel to it. The colours are from the 1970s palette too, browns and beiges.
It looks a simple idea. The cubes can be turned to represent every possible date from 1 to 31. It is deceptively simple. Jorgnesen needed to apply some skill to work out which numbers went on which cube.
The secret is that '9' is '6' upside down. So 6 or 9 only appears once on the two cubes. Also 0, 1 and 2 need to be on both cubes, but 3 only needs to match with 0 and 1, so does not. The rest of the numbers are divided between the two cubes.
The numbers on the cubes are:
- 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
- 0, 1, 2, 6( or 9), 7, 8
The calendar was manufactured by Copenhagen Creative Workshop Inc. It is dated 1973.
Jorgensen also designed a cylindrical slide rule (1970) and a thermometer housed in a hexagonal aluminium section.
- Designer: Erik Ole Jorgensen
- Manufacturer: Copenhagen Creative Workshops Inc
- Date: 1973
Variations
There are some colour variations:
- Cream base, dark brown cubes with white numerals
- Red base, cream cubes with red numerals
- Black base, one cube is grey with white numerals, the other is cream with grey numerals
There is also a larger version which includes the day of the week and the year.
How much is it worth?
These calendars are rare. They do not come up on eBay very often. In fact when I looked there were none in the completed listings and I could only find one for sale in the USA for $55.
I would value it at around $50/£50
The slide rules are more common and fetch from $10 to $40 in the USA. Factors such as condition and original box improve the value.
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