ambiente – decorate life

Alessi is a big family, and here we have who collaborates to make Alessi the Dream Factory!

Andrea Branzi

Born in Florence in 1938, architect and designer. Critic on magazines such as Domus, Interni, Casabella and Modo, he was one of the founders of the Domus Academy and is one of the members of the EEC Commission for the promotion of the European design. He has worked for Cassina, Vitra, Zanotta.

Fratelli Campana

Umberto Campana, lawyer and Fernando Campana, architect, have been working together in San Paolo since 1983 in the field of artistic design. They came into the limelight in 1989 with the furniture exhibition provocatively entitled “Gli inconfortabili” (The Inconsolable), a political manifesto rather than functional objects. Their radical point of view is strengthened by the use of poor materials and industrial rubbish. Hand-made products represent the possibility of social redemption in a poor country. Their intention is, howeverto find a way for Brazilian design, avoiding European colonisation. In Italy, they participated in the “Viaggio in Italia” exhibition at Abitare il Tempo in Verona in 1994 and in 1995 at the exhibition organised at the Brazilian Consulate in Milan “Il Brasile fa anche design”. In 1997 they designed lights for O Luce. Some of their pieces appear in the International Design Year Book of 1997, edited by Philippe Starck. In 1998 the Moma in New York dedicated the “Progetto 66″ exhibition to them, coupled with Ingo Maurer.

Achille Castiglioni

Castiglioni was born in 1918 and studied architecture at the Polytechnic in Milan. Just after World War II he joined the studio run by his two older brothers Livio and Pier Giacomo, also architects. When Livio left the practice in 1952, Achille and Pier Giacomo collaborated until the latter’s premature death in 1968. During the course of his long career, which continues today, Castiglioni has designed dozens of objects, as well as temporary architecture for numerous art exhibitions, trade fairs, and showrooms. This exhibition presents a selection of these objects, as well as three reconstructed rooms from 1957, 1965, and 1984 that further demonstrate his design philosophy, based on observation and free association.

Massimiliano Fuksas

Massimiliano Fuksas was born in Rome in 1944, where he graduated in architecture from La Sapienza University in 1969. In 1967 he opened a practice in Rome, followed in 1989 and 1993 by firms in Paris and Vienna. He now lives and works shuttling between Rome and Paris. He has taught in numerous universities, including the Staadtliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Stuttgart, the École Spéciale d’Architecture in Paris, the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Vienna, Columbia University in New York, and La Sapienza University in Rome. In 1998 he won the Vitruvio International a la Trayectoria Award in Buenos Aires for his career. In 1999 he received the Grand Prix d’Architecture Française and the following year was named Accademico Nazionale di San Luca and Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française. In 2002 he was awarded the aia’s Honorary Fellowship. In 1998-2000 he was director of the 7th International Biennale of Architecture in Venice exhibition: Less Aesthetics, More Ethics. Since January 2000 he has written the architectural column in L’Espresso that was founded by Bruno Zevi. His professional practice centers principally on the creation of public works, including university buildings and major urban complexes.

Frank Gehry

Born in 1930, he studied architecture at the University of Southern California and studied City Planning at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard. He developed projects of private and public city planning in America, Japan. In Europe, he has recently been awarded the Pritsker Architecture Prize in 1989 and the Wolf Prize in Art in 1992. His projects have been published all over the world. The most important retrospective, “The Architecture of Frank O. Gehry” has been organized by the Walker Art Center in 1986 and has travelled the major American museums.

Massimo Giacon

Born in Padua in 1961. Since 1980 he has shuttled back and forth between Milan and Padua working at his various jobs as comic strip artist, illustrator, designer, artist, and musician. Since the early eighties he has been one of the major comic strip artists involved in the phenomenon of the Italian comic strip revival originating from magazines such as Frigidaire, Alter, Dolce Vita, Cyborg, and Nova Express. In 1985 he began to work with Sottsass Associati. He continued with his design work, collaborating with Matteo Thun, Atelier Mendini, Sieger Design and producing projects for Memphis, Alessi, Philips, Zero Disegno, Swatch, and Artemide. In 1990 he began a career in art that led him to hold numerous exhibitions in Italy, Switzerland, the United States, Greece, Portugal, and Japan.
Since 1994 he has handled the graphics for telematics networks, CD-ROMs, and web-sites.
After a decade of playing music with various bands, his first solo album Horror Vacui was released in 1996.
He has designed hangings, carpets, ceramics, kitchen objects, produced advertising illustrations and worked with fashion designers and magazines (Romeo Gigli, Vanity, Elle). He has also fitted out international trade fairs. He is now working on a line of toys for Brinkhaus, a virtual character for RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana, and an exhibition of works with pornographic subjects.

Stefano Giovannoni

Stefano Giovannoni studied architecture at Florence University until 1978. From 1979 he taught there, as well as at the Domus Academy in Milan and the Università del Progetto in Reggio Emilia. Stefano Giovannoni is an industrial designer, interior decorator, and architect. In the 1980s Stefano Giovannoni and Guido Venturini founded the King-Kong studio. They collaborated on the extremely successful “Girotondo” line for Alessi, which includes numerous household appliances and utilitarian objects made of metal and plastic and featuring the distinctive cut-out stick-man pictogram. In the 1990s Stefano Giovannoni created numerous original designs and such Alessi classics as the “Fruit Mama” (1993) fruit bowl, the “Merdolina” (1993) toilet brush, and the “Lilliput” (1993) salt and peppers. In 1995 Stefano Giovannoni designed “Mary Biscuit”, a cookie jar of garishly colored plastic with an outsize cookie on the lid. This creation was followed up in 1998 by the “Ship Shape” butter dish, and, in 2000, by the “Cico” egg cup. In 2003 Stefano Giovannoni ddesigned the “Mami” line of cookware, tableware, and kitchen cutlery. Stefano Giovannoni also works for a host of other firms, including Magis, Flos, Fiat, Seiko, Siemens, Henkel, Lavazza, and Helit.

Michael Graves

Born in Indianapolis, he teaches architecture in Princeton since 1962. His architectural works include the Portland Building and the Humana Building, the extension of the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Newark Museum. He created the best-selling 9093 kettle for Alessi

Marcello Jori

Marcello Jori was born in Merano on 12 December 1951. He currently lives and works in Bologna. Having obtained his degree from DAMS (Drama, Art and Music Studies, Bologna), in 1977 Jori embarked on his career as an artist, soon exhibiting in national and foreign galleries and museums. In the mid-seventies, Jori took his first tentative steps in certain conceptual streams, from which he soon moved away and indeed openly went against their colder and most austere aspects, in an attempt to infuse art with a new lease of life. This he did with a series of photographic works, in which he reinterprets a number of classical masterpieces in a modern key. In this way, art is brought back to a human dimension; the artist “gives body” to the paintings, and takes possession of them so as to transform them into something true. Thus, an abstract painting depicting sunset is exposed to the lights and colours of a real sunset (“Tramonto sul mare sul mare a tramonto” – Sunset over the sea over the sea at sunset, 1976). In 1979, Jori painted himself on top of a ladder painting the fall of the angel, in contact with the heavens, which marked a turning point in his artistic career. This painting displays a new expressive energy that featured in his works over the entire following decade. It was during this phase that painting became central to his creative evolution. These were the years of the “Scritture” (Inscriptions), vertical and fluctuating words suspended mid air between the real and the artist’s mental idea of space. These words were then caged in multicoloured “Teatrini” (Theatres), extravagant examples of architecture in movement that were the forerunners of the following “Cristalli” (Crystals) and “Gioie” (Jewels) series, enchanted and kaleidoscopic geometric patterns.

Mika H.J. Kim

Born in Seoul, Korea, in 1972, he graduated with Bachelor’s degree in Visual and Industrial Design at the Seoul National University, and he had a Master’s degree in Industrial and Spatial Design. Chief Designer for the Design Studio Mika & Heni, Budapest. He has participated in several design projects and exhibitions as a designer and adviser and winner of the Special Prize, Korean Industrial Design Exhibition 2001, hosted by KIDP, Seoul.

 

King-Kong

From 1985 up to 1989, this has been the name adopted by the architects Stefano Giovannoni and Guido Venturini, creators of an elementary, playful cartoon language which made its mark on design in the early 90s.

Doriana O. Mandrelli

Doriana O. Mandrelli was born in Rome, where she graduated in History of Art from La Sapienza University in 1979. At the same University, she attended the School of Architecture, taught contemporary architecture and was a member of the board of In/arch (Istituto Nazionale di Architettura). She is director’s assistance at the 7th International Biennale of Architecture in Venice and curator of some special sections of the exhibition. In 2002 she was named Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française. Her partnership with Massimiliano Fuksas dates from 1985. She directs the Fuksas Design Section. Her work is characterised by continuous research into new materials and new techniques of manufacturing.

Alberto Meda

Born in Lenno Tremezzina in the province of Como in 1945, he graduated in mechanical engineering at the Milan Polytechnic in 1969. After being the technical director of Kartell in the seventies, he dedicated himself to design, applying his experience in polyurethane resins and new materials in general. In this period he won two Compasso d’Oro awards.

Alessandro Mendini

Born in Milan in 1931, former director of Casabella, Modo and Domus, winner of a Compasso d’Oro and designer of the Groninger Museum in Groningen, the Casino in Arosa, the Forum in Omegna, he is a designer, architect and image consultant for Philips, Swarovski, Swatch, and Bisazza.

Miriam Mirri

She was born in Bologna in 1964, lives and works in Milan. She graduated at the Superior School for Anotomic Design and studied communication and design at the Università del Progetto in Reggio Emilia. She worked in London with Nigel Coates and has been assistant to Stefano Giovannoni for many years. She designs objects for companies such as Mandarina Duck, Mitsubishi, United Pets. She holds design courses at the Università del Progetto in Reggio Emilia.

Jasper Morrison

Jasper Morrison is one of today’s most influential industrial designers. Born in London in 1959, he is renowned for his ascetically elegant, quietly humorous style and has designed everything from a tray-table to a tram system.
Morrison grew up between London and New York. He studied design at Kingston Polytechnic, the Royal College of Art and at the HdK in Berlin. In 1986, a year after graduating from the RCA, Morrison opened his Office for Design in London. Editor of the Design Year Book 1999 with a passion for the history of design, Morrison designs for Cappellini, Vitra, Magis, Flos, Rosenthal and Sony.

Donata Paruccini

Born in 1966 in Milan, she graduated in Industrial Design at ISIA, Florence, with Jonathan De Pas. Since working with Andrea Branzi, she has exhibited her works in group exhibitions in Europe and Japan.

Jorge Pensi

Jorge Pensi was born in 1946 in Buenos Aires, where in 1969 he obtained a degree in architecture and industrial design. In 1975 he moved to Spain, first to Alicante and then to Barcelona, where he collaborated with Grupo Berenguer until 1984. In 1985 he set up his own studio, specialising in furniture design. He has worked with some of the most important Spanish, Italian, French, German and American companies. Furthermore, he has received numerous awards and acknowledgements for his products, and in particular the National Design Award in 1997.

Hani Rashid

Rashid was born in Cairo in 1958. He studied architecture in Canada and in the United States, before opening his New York Asymptote Studio in 1988. He holds various teaches posts worldwide, and with his studio has designed a vast range of works that place him well ahead of his peers in the field of digital design. His projects span from experimental spatial installations to digital architecture. His most innovative works include two multi-dimensional and interactive architectural environments, i.e. the New York Stock Exchange Virtual Trading Floor and the Guggenheim Virtual Museum.

Karim Rashid

Born in Cairo in 1960. He receives a bachelor of Industrial Design in Canada in 1982 and postgraduate studies in Italy. For seven years he is at KAN Industrial Design and co-designs the Babel Fashion Collection for 6 years. In 1993, he opens his own studio in New York City. His works are in the permanent collections of 14 Museums. His perspective and clients are global and while considers him more of a cultural provocateur, his projects range is from products, interiors, fashion, furniture, lighting, art, music to installations.

Aldo Rossi

Born in Milan (1931-1997), he is considered by many to be the greatest Italian architect of the second half of the 20th century. His life as an architect started with Gardella and Zanuso. An author of abstraction, reduction and brevitas, his severe language of primary shapes, geometrical patterns and silent evocation created some of the most intensely poetic works of architecture and design in his age.

Marta Sansoni

Born in Florence in 1963, architect and designer. In her Florence studio she creates designs for private homes, commercial spaces, outlets and interior fittings. Several of her works have been mentioned by “The international design yearbook 1999″ and by “Designing the 21st century”.

Richard Sapper

Born in Munich in 1932, he studied philosophy, anatomy, graphics, engineering and economics. Ten times winner of the Compassi d’Oro, his prime interest is the design of technically complex objects, from ships to watches.

Ettore Sottsass

Born in Innsbruck in 1917, he is known the world over as one of the initiators of the revolution in architecture and design which led away from the rigid functionalism of the years prior to and following the Second World War. A great and influential Maestro of Italian design, the energy of his language and the vitality of his colour and line contrast sharply with any intellectualism and rigidity. He dies in December 2007.

Philippe Starck

Born in Paris in 1949, he is one of the most original and creative designers of our time. He has obtained many important acknowledgements such as the Grand Prix National de la Création industrielle and the Honor Award of the American Institute of Architects, he considers himself as “a Japanese architect, an American art director, a German industrial designer, a French artistic director, an Italian furniture designer”.

Guido Venturini

Born in Alfonsine, in 1957. Architect, designer, and explorer of the world of industrial design, space management and internal architecture (including the famous Maddalena Loveburger project in Prato, together with Stefano Giovannoni).