Poul Henningsen, born in Copenhagen in 1894, was the son of the Danish writers Agnes Henningsen and Carl Ewald. He started practicing traditional functionalist architecture, but over the years his professional interests shifted to primarily focus on lighting, for which he is most famous. He also expanded his field of occupation into areas of writing, becoming a journalist and an author. For a short period at the beginning of WWII, Henningsen was the head architect of the Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen. But like many other creative people, he was forced to flee Denmark during the German occupation, and soon became a vital part of the Danish colony of artists living in Sweden.