Inhoudsopgave van 2023 / 05 - Interni

The story of a rebirth accompanies Bottega Intreccio, the brand established at Mogliano (MC) in the Marche region in 2019, with the purpose of restoring vitality to the local weaving tradition. In this production district well known throughout Europe in the 1800s for its refined production of baskets and wicker or rattan objects, the first Italian contemporary school has been founded to train new generations of weavers. Its values include environmental and social sustainability (with the inclusion of young people, some of whom arrived in Italy as refugees), so giving rise to the Carteca school project. These were then transferred to the Bottega Intreccio brand. Its creative direction was entrusted to the AngelettiRuzza Design practice, where we were told: “Bottega Intreccio was founded out of a strong sense of belonging…

EXHIBITIONS Demonios Familiares is the first solo exhibition by Guglielmo Castelli (Turin, 1987) presented by the Mendes Wood DM gallery in New York from 23 March to 29 April. Here the artist explains some salient features of his practice and poetic: his arrival at figuration through abstraction, the sources of inspiration of the titles of his works, the value of color, the relations between work and space. Where does the title of the exhibition come from and why did you choose it? Demonios Familiares is the title of a book published posthumously in 2015 by the Spanish writer Ana María Matute. For most of her life she wrote about the transition from the enchantment of childhood to adulthood. I thought it was a great title to start from. And who…

The former Soviet prison of Vilnius, located in the center of the Lithuanian capital, was closed down in 2019. In 2021 it became a sound set for films and TV series, including the famous Stranger Things. Finally, in 2022, it opened its doors to the first events, exhibitions and concerts under the name Lukiskes Prison 2.0: a new cultural center that seeks to move beyond its past through its architectural fascination and above all the strength of the city’s creative scene. Temporary exhibitions and concerts by musicians such as Moderat have been held in the central square and more than 200 recently created studios. While the rapid change of direction given to this immense Soviet structure is astonishing, its protracted activity as a prison in the very heart of the…

“Beauty will save the world”: so Prince Myshkin says in Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, seeing beauty as a universal axiom capable of recomposing the structural disorder of reality into a harmonious unity. A disorder that is also synonymous, however, with a vital genesis and which Metabolism, a cultural movement that arose in Japan in the 1960s, strongly inspiring Kenzo Tange, interprets as a constituent figure of contemporary cities. They are living organisms in constant transformation, to which architecture and urban planning respond with a flexible and versatile lexicon, high standards of quality and efficient technologies. If the inevitable change not only of the territory, but also of the people who live it, is the beauty conveyed by artistic expression, the union acquires a salvific character. This is what has happened in…

IDEAL STANDARD, “DESIGN SHOOTING” EXHIBITION, MILAN. PHOTOS: MAURO SERRA AND ALBINA SOKHOVA AN EXHIBITION AND A COMPETITION ON THE ILLUSTRATION OF CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE THROUGH THE LANGUAGE OF PHOTOGRAPHY: IDEAL STANDARD, IN COLLABORATION WITH TOWANT, HAS PRODUCED “DESIGN SHOOTING,” WHICH FOR THE SECOND YEAR IN A ROW CREATES AN OPPORTUNITY FOR CREATIVE EXCHANGE BETWEEN 16 PHOTOGRAPHERS AND 16 DESIGN STUDIOS. LEFT, THE OPENZONE WORKSITE IN BRESSO OF AMDL CIRCLE, A HEALTHCARE SCIENCE CAMPUS CREATED BY GRUPPO ZAMBON, PHOTOGRAPHED BY MAURO SERRA. RIGHT, THE SHOT BY ALBINA SOKHOVA TAKEN DURING CONSTRUCTION OF THE LÈBÉL OFFICE BUILDING, A LEED&WELL PROJECT BY CONSALEZ ROSSI ARCHITETTI ASSOCIATI, ON VIA GALLARATE IN MILAN. THE ARCHITECTS COMMENT: “FROM THE ENTRANCE OF THE GHISALLO OVERPASS THE BUILDING HAS THE APPEARANCE OF A TRUE URBAN GATEWAY. ON THE OUTSIDE,…

Project by GIORGIO CERRAI/ NEATSTUDIO Sea, breezes, sand dunes, pine groves, age-old trees, aromas of Mediterranean brush. Roccamare, in Tuscany, on the coast of Maremma near Grosseto, is deeply rooted in this forceful nature that has fascinated so many people in the world of culture, architecture and entertainment. Such as the young Ernesto Nathan Rogers, who towards the end of the 1950s designed Villa Bartolini in the pine grove, in this region of architectural experimentation for Italian modernism. “It is impossible to remain immune to the material and immaterial impressions of a territory where until a few decades ago the innermost streets of the allotment plan were still dirt roads, and there were more fences than gates amidst the buildings,” says Giorgio Cerrai, founder of NeatStudio, the firm responsible for…

Project by LEE BROOM Anyone who has been on hand for Milano Design Week in recent years will recall the spectacular installations by Lee Broom for the FuoriSalone, from the reference to an American department store to echoes of the Pantheon, by way of a van that contained Kubrick-ian spaces. The latest project by the British designer continues along these lines, where surprise meets history in a constant game of refinement and theatrical impact. It is a penthouse located in Tribeca, Manhattan, a hybrid location where Lee Broom resides during his long stays in the city. When he is absent, the space becomes a showroom. The luminous apartment has an area of about 280 square meters, on the fifth and sixth floors of a 19th-century building on White Street, accessed…

MASTERS It the experience during the pandemic in recent years has demonstrated the necessity of osmosis between the external functions of urban space and the internal characteristics of domestic space, on a conceptual level the preparation of this new dimension of exchange comes from much further away, starting with the farsighted visions of Ugo La Pietra. An architect by training, a designer in the wider sense of the term, he is the only ‘radical’ who still moves forward with that approach today. La Pietra is now going through an extremely prolific moment, underscoring the central importance of his outlook and revealing its pioneering force. Already in 1966, he was reasoning on the idea of “inhabiting the city,” transferring the almost ethological approach to the experience of living space into an…

INTERNATIONAL TRADE FAIRS THE CROSSROADS From 21 to 23 May, the ICFF (International Contemporary Furniture Fair) and WantedDesign Manhattan will be back at the Javits Center NY, presenting itself as the most representative trade fair in North America for the furniture sector. Around ‘10,000 visitors and 450 brands from 25 countries are expected. Among the novelties, The Crossroads, the area of connection between the two fairs, which will become a focal point of the event, devoted to American Design. The Crossroads, the space designed in collaboration with Rockwell Group, is hosting 17 US-based design practices and firms, representing established and rising designers/craftworkers/entrepreneurs. For the occasion the prestigious American studio headed by David Rockwell has created a playful and engaging ambiance by playing on the dialogue between two pillars of US…

PRODUCTION It stands in the middle of the room or against the wall, restrained and geometric. A light and apparently simple presence, yet astonishing in its details and its ability to adapt to the space. The Civitas bookcase designed by Giulio Iacchetti for Midj awaits discovery. As the designer explains: “The theme of the bookcase can be approached in two ways: either you design the sculptural object or you create an open-ended system. I prefer the latter approach to design: you have to think of products that can meet people’s needs and be modulated to suit the space. The name Civitas is a metaphor for the city that grows in an orderly way on the matrix of the Roman encampment. Like the city, the library can also grow and change,…

SHOWROOMS Wooster Street, SoHo. This is the new address of Salvatori’s first North American showroom, as well as the headquarters of its US division. The space acts as showplace for design specializing in tailor-made creations, with a view to a total look embodying precious natural stone in tactile surfaces, sculptural products for the bathroom and contemporary furnishings for the home. With a floorspace of over 600 square meters, the interior is configured as a flexible concept space, complete with a boutique at the entrance devoted to objects and an ‘apartment’ fitted out with a marble kitchen in the basement. A gallery-style approach to design, original cast-iron columns, and exposed brick walls celebrate the cultural and stylistic connection with SoHo. The creative energy of the neighborhood and the sophisticated image of…

CINEMA A man, Pietro, is warned by a female voice of the death of his father, who has bequeathed him a gun and his brother a chair, Enzo Mari’s Chair 1 to be precise. Pietro sets off on foot, covering the spaces of a Sardinia that is very different from a tourist brochure, to find his brother, whom he has not seen for years, and give him their father’s legacy. This in short is the plot of La sedia (“The Chair”), the new film written, directed, photographed and edited by the artist Gianluca Vassallo. We met him to talk about it. Some time ago, in describing the film to me, you wrote that the idea came to you when you began to process the likelihood that your father, his health…

ARCHITECTURE Project by MARCO CASAMONTI/ARCHEA ASSOCIATI Pietrasanta, a city in lower Versilia, in the province of Lucca, is a place with deep ties to echoes of distant histories, intertwining the colors of ancient Apuana stone and landscapes described in the poetry of Giosuè Carducci. The latter was born in a village not so far from the walled town, where artists like Henry Moore and Joan Miró, Igor Mitoraj, Arnaldo Pomodoro and Fernando Botero lived, contributing to make the area famous as a center for the crafting of marble and bronze, now known around the world. A little Athens, as it has been called, also thanks to the presence of many art galleries. This erudite tradition forms the backdrop for the theme of relations with the context approached in the project…

Project by MARTINA DESIGN with ARCH. ROBERTO GILI and LORENZO VASSALLO At the entrance of this flat in the center of Saluzzo one is immediately transported into a situation suspended between past and future. A place where time seems to stand still, where history and the present meet in a single dimension. This suspended atmosphere was precisely what the owners were seeking. Everything springs from the original essence of this building from the 1700s, formerly a monastery. An understated, straightforward setting, neglected and abandoned, though once it was stripped of its original trappings revealed a strong personality, lending itself to an idea of conservation and revolution at the same time. The project is a dual or actually three-way effort, where the collaboration of Martina Design and the architect Roberto Gili…

The Italian Pavilion of the Venice Biennale curated by Fosbury is a voyage to the center of architecture, its nature and its meaning. The Milan-based group brings with it the choral vitality of the generation under 35, based on a vision of design as investigation, prior to construction. This is the red thread of the nine ‘pioneering actions’ of preparation for the show in Venice: nine site-specific experiences in nine Italian locations, conceived to extend the temporal dimension of the project for the Biennale. “Spaziale” is the title of the introduction to the pavilion, a case of research in progress, not simply the documentation of works already completed. Why? The limit of traditional architecture exhibitions is that we are forced to utilize display solutions to narrate accomplished projects: from the…

MASTERS There is a strong recurring presence of nature in the works presented in April in Milan by Gaetano Pesce: a joyful, cheerful and friendly nature, but also intimate, connected to the life and memories of the designer, his past experiences, his desire for comprehension and introspection. Hence the mountains, the sea, the colors of blazing sunsets or delicate dawns, but also colors that evoke and delve into the inner human spirit. Then there is the question of figuration, another favorite Pesce theme. Convinced that western abstract culture is in decline, that abstraction taken to extremes erases any identity and generates an obscure, incomprehensible and undecipherable world, the designer urges the necessity, in design, architecture or literature, of proposing new forms, which can be very innovative and experimental, but should…

ANNIVERSARY Stool 60 has a great future behind it. The icon designed by Alvar Aalto in 1933 turns 90, having always stood for the Finnish approach to design, sustainable and inspired by nature. A true classic of modernity, Stool 60 is produced in Finland by a 48-step process that bends birchwood into its characteristic L shape and reuses the offcuts from production to manufacture new specimens. To celebrate its anniversary, Artek, the company founded in 1935 by Alvar and Aino Aalto, Maire Gullichsen and Nils-Gustav Hahl, has produced three different limited editions of the stool (limited by time of sale and not number of copies). The first is Kontrasti, which pays homage to its creation by using the different shades of the various levels of veneer to bring out the…

EXHIBITIONS An exhibition presenting over 200 works, which opened last April and is set to run until 3 September at two exhibition venues in Milan: the Museo del Novecento and Palazzo Morando | Costume Moda Immagine. This is FuturLiberty, created in collaboration with Liberty and Electa, with the scientific curatorship of Ester Coen and the artistic direction of Federico Forquet for the fabrics: an exhibition that explores the course of the Futurist movement by proposing an original connection between painting and applied arts that creates a dialogue between the works of some of the most famous Futurists (Balla, Severini, Boccioni, Carrà, Depero) and the Vorticist paintings by English contemporaries, such as Percy Wyndham Lewis and Christopher Nevinson. Artists who, in turn, provided the inspiration that guided Federico Forquet and the…

YACHT DESIGN It has a timeless, restrained and essential design. It is versatile, flexible, adaptable to any style and sphere, from residential to hospitality and the nautical sector, where it originated. Jacques-Yves is a modular seating system created by the collaboration between Poltrona Frau’s Custom Interiors division and Zuccon International Project. The Rome-based multidisciplinary design studio, specializing in yacht design and active since the 70s, is now helmed by Bernardo and Martina Zuccon, who have long been committed to exploring new design areas and new types of homes. With Jacques-Yves, the Zuccon studio opens a new chapter in its history, bringing the experience gained in yachting to product design. Poltrona Frau has long had close ties to yachting. Already in the ‘30s it was making luxury transatlantic fittings. Today it…

ARCHITECTURE Project by PEIA ASSOCIATI An ethereal, radiant atmosphere for a penthouse designed by the Italian studio Peia Associati, helmed by Giampiero Peia and Marta Nasazzi, on the two upper levels of a tower in Doha, Qatar. The apartment with an area of about 800 square meters, with fine views of the sea on all sides, captures the bright light of the Persian Gulf, creating an effect of spatial expansion accentuated by the fluidity of the rooms and the sinuous forms of the furnishings and the elements of the construction. The lower level contains a living area with a dining and bar zone, spatially and visually interconnected, and a panoramic terrace; the upper level is for the more private spaces, with the bedrooms, services and home theater. The link between…

Project by NOA While every one of us has a history made of encounters, some of them seem to begin under a good sign when it comes to elective affinities, also in terms of interior architecture in an age of globalization. This project is one of them. NOA, the architecture and interior design studio, after a number of works that combine traditional Alpine references with faraway lands, listened to the intriguing story of a client who has spent 20 years on travels and adventures in England, Singapore, New Zealand and many other countries; for her return to Innsbruck, the designers have ‘concocted’ a house for her, like an exclusive bespoke suit of clothing. An interior that speaks of other skies, but with the impressive silhouette of the Alps in the…

In both art and design there are two main ways to approach the aesthetic meaning of things. The first, known as ‘figurative’ in art and ‘representative’ in the world of design, is based on the capacity of the object to depict, or to represent, something other than itself. This is the case of paintings of natural landscapes or human subjects, or of ornamental furnishings decorated with figurative motifs. The other way, known as ‘abstract’ in art and ‘conformity’ in design, considers aesthetic quality to be an intrinsic property of the object, whether it is an abstract painting like those of Kandinsky, or a design piece of the modern movement. The dichotomy between these two approaches, which has defined design culture from the outset, has been further complicated over the last…