Warren McArthur Anodized Aluminum Study Desk, State Library of Virginia, 1939

This rare study desk is a documented, site-specific design by Warren McArthur, produced for the Rare Book Room of the State Library of Virginia and installed in 1939. The commission was part of a comprehensive furnishing program in which McArthur supplied a substantial portion of the library’s interior, including sofas, lounge chairs, occasional tables, office desks, chairs, and lamps. The project represents one of the most fully realized institutional installations undertaken by the Warren McArthur Corporation during its New York period.

Within this broader program, individual study desks were assigned to law students affiliated with the University of Virginia, reinforcing the desk’s role as fixed scholarly furniture rather than a generalized or decorative office form. The design reflects the rigor of an academic environment in which furniture was conceived as durable, standardized infrastructure for long-term use.

This example represents the shelf version, the rarer of the two known desk variants produced for the project. The elevated rear shelf—measuring approximately 8 by 50.5 inches—was designed to accommodate reference materials and working volumes while preserving a clear and disciplined primary writing surface. The desk top measures approximately 50.5 inches wide by 37.5 inches deep, with a working height of 30 inches and an overall height of 42 inches.

Executed in anodized aluminum, the desk exemplifies McArthur’s prewar institutional vocabulary: tubular uprights, precisely machined connectors, and a restrained architectural geometry emphasizing strength, clarity, and efficiency. The Formica work surface, consistent with McArthur’s institutional practice, was refinished in the early 1950s, transitioning from its original black to the present muted green. Smoking was permitted in the State Library of Virginia until 2006, and prolonged exposure to tobacco smoke is known to discolor early laminates. The refinishing should therefore be understood as a pragmatic mid-century maintenance intervention in response to decades of intensive scholarly use, rather than a departure from original intent.

A surviving Warren McArthur Corporation label bearing the One Park Avenue address and patent references confirms New York production and period authenticity. With only 24 desks produced for the State Library commission—and fewer surviving examples known—this shelf variant occupies a particularly narrow and important position within McArthur’s institutional output, best understood as an architectural artifact of American prewar modernism.