Cuadrille Nest Tables by G Plan

British furniture manufacturing company G-Plan was launched in 1953, but its roots go back much further. In 1898, Ebenezer Gomme (1858–1931) set up a fine woodworking atelier, E. Gomme Ltd., in High Wycombe, England, a major center of British furniture manufacturing. By the early 1900s, E. Gomme had transitioned into a larger factory facility, and in 1911, his sons took the helm. The company was revered for its range of high-quality sideboards, tables, and other cabinet goods and for pioneering the concept of dining room sets, designed and made to match. By the 1960s, the Scandinavian look was sweeping international design, and British-made furniture was being outsold by Danish imports. To compete, G-Plan brought in Danish designer Ib Kofod-Larsen to create new collections in fine woods, like teak and rosewood. While these Kofod-Larsen pieces have become very collectible today, at the time, they were not well appreciated by the design community—perhaps viewed as lesser variations on the furniture available from Scandinavia. Despite the competition, G-Plan remained one of the most recognized names in furniture manufacturing in the UK through the end of the 1970s.

In 1987 the Gomme family sold the business to the then directors, who, three years later, sold it to the Christie Tyler Group. In 1996, the Morris Furniture Group acquired the license to make and market G-Plan Cabinet furniture in Glasgow. This operates separately from the upholstery business, G-Plan Upholstery Ltd., which continues to manufacture most of its sofa and armchair products in the UK.