Martha Nierenberg (March 12, 1924 – June 27, 2020) (known in full as Martha née Weiss de Csepel Nierenberg), was a Hungarian-born American businesswoman who co-founded Dansk International Designs.
Early life and education
Nierenberg was born in Budapest on March 12, 1924, into one of Hungary's wealthiest families. She was the daughter of Alfonz Weiss de Csepel, who headed the Manfréd Weiss Steel and Metal Works and its foundation[1] and Erzsbet Herzog Weiss de Csepel, a medical doctor who had studied psychiatry in Vienna with Anna Freud.
She had two brothers (John, 1936–2017) and a sister (Mary Radcliffe). Jewish by birth, Martha attended a Calvinist school, to focus on science and math, then enrolled in a science college in Budapest.[2]
Her maternal grandfather, the banker Baron Mór Lipót Herzog (1869–1934), numbered among Europe's leading art and antiquities collectors. Her paternal grandfather, Manfred Weiss de Csepel, founded the Manfred Weiss Steel and Metal Works, Hungary's largest machine factory, employing 40,000 people once.