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Otto Schulz
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Born in Germany in 1882, Otto Schulz trained at several architectural institutions in Berlin and Charlottenburg before relocating to Gothenburg in 1907. He arrived in Sweden during a period of considerable cultural optimism, and the country's design world was ripe for the kind of synthesis between craft tradition and modern sensibility that Schulz would come to represent.
In 1920, together with Adolf Nordenberg, Schulz founded Firma Boet in Gothenburg, an interior design firm and showroom that would become one of the most influential furniture enterprises in twentieth-century Sweden. The firm was not simply a commercial operation: Schulz used it as a laboratory for experimentation, developing proprietary techniques he patented under names such as Bopoint, Bosaik, and Botarsia. These methods contributed distinctive surface qualities and structural refinements to his furniture, marking Boet pieces as immediately recognizable.
Alongside the furniture enterprise, Schulz published the magazine Boet, a design and interiors journal that ran articles on leading Swedish architects and designers. As editor until 1938, he helped shape taste and professional discourse during the years that bracketed both Swedish Grace and the arrival of functionalism - two movements whose tensions ran through his own design practice. His work navigated both: the opulent inlaid cabinetry of the Swedish Grace period and the cleaner upholstered forms of Swedish Modern.
The most enduring result of his career is the Schulz lounge chair, designed in 1936. With its generous proportions and emphasis on comfort, the chair became a staple reference in surveys of Swedish furniture history. Originally produced by Boet, production was taken over by Jio Möbler in Jönköping in 1941, extending the chair's reach well beyond the Gothenburg showroom. Over 1,600 watercolors, sketches, and drawings documenting Schulz's design work are preserved in the archive of the Röhsska Museum in Gothenburg.
Schulz retired in 1950, and Boet closed with his departure. He died in 1970 in Sweden. On the Nordic auction market, his furniture circulates steadily, with the Schulz chair in its various configurations being the most frequently offered piece. Top results at Swedish auction include pairs of fåtöljer reaching above 37,000 SEK, with the majority of lots appearing at Bukowskis, Göteborgs Auktionsverk, and regional houses such as Palsgaard Kunstauktioner. His work appears across 41 lots in the Auctionist index, spanning chairs, sofas, cabinets, and tables.