Gubi Cobra Floor Lamp

GUBI is a Danish design company dedicated to celebrating the luxury of living life.

Positioned at the point where the beauty of history meets the thrill of right now, GUBI is the creative force and curator behind some of the world’s most extraordinary design from the 20th century onwards. Whether diving into archives or driving the designs of today, GUBI is responsible for a timeless, inventive, and intercontinental collection of furniture, lighting and interior objects that merge function with meaning, enhancing every space.

Greta Magnusson Grossman (1906-1999) maintained a prolific forty-year career in Europe and North America, and operated as mover and shaker in the male dominated world of mid-century modern design. Her achievements were many and encompassed industrial design, interior design and architecture. In 1933, having successfully completed her fellowship at the renowned Stockholm arts institution, Konstfack, she opened Studio, a combined store and workshop in Stockholm. During the same year Greta M. Grossman married jazz musician, Billy Grossman with whom she later emigrated to the United States, settling in Los Angeles.

Upon their arrival in California in 1940, Grossman opened a well publicized shop on Rodeo Drive, where she was among the first to bring the Scandinavian modern aesthetic to southern California's burgeoning modernist scene. Her unique approach to Swedish modernism was an instant hit in Los Angeles, and soon she attracted celebrity clients, and appearing alongside the likes of Charles Eames and Isamu Noguchi. 

While Grossman is the architect behind more than 15 homes spanning the globe from California to Sweden, she is most noted for her industrial designs like the Gräshoppa Floor Lamp and Cobra Table Lamp.

Through the 1940's and 50's Grossman exhibited her designs at museums worldwide, including MoMA in New York and The National Museum in Stockholm. Yet inexplicably, following her retirement in the late 1960's Grossman’s name all but disappeared from the design landscape.