Video killed the Radio Star

Raymond Loewy: TV-Set, 1948

If you had lived in the USA of the 1950s, you would have encountered products designed by Raymond Loewy all day long: alarm clocks, toothpaste tubes, razors, fridges, cars, busses and trains, or logos such as the shell shape of the Shell petrol stations, which is still known today.

He also designed one of the first TV sets for the Hallicrafters company. Back then, people still used terms like ‘Telehor’, which is a modification of telephone (‘tele’ is Greek and means ‘distant’ and ‘horao’ means ‘to see’).

The monitor was very small and could only display black and white pictures. Remote controls did not yet exist.