08/09/2025
To mark International Literacy Day what better than this iconic bookcase, designed to fit Penguin paperbacks.
Egon Riss (1901-1964)
Penguin Donkey, Mark 1
birch plywood
60cm wide, 43cm high, 42cm deep
The Penguin Donkey was designed by the architect Egon Riss in 1939 and made by Isokon, probably the most forward-thinking British furniture manufacturer of the 1930s, whose founder Jack Pritchard worked with the leading modernist designers and architects of the day to produce innovative furniture which have become design icons. This useful portable bookcase was named the Donkey because of its organic, curvilinear shape with four legs and two ‘panniers’. Penguin paperback books fit perfectly in the panniers while the space between them can be used for magazines and newspapers.
Due to the outbreak of WWII, only about 100 Donkeys were made and it is rare to find an original example today.