Who is Elena Tartari

"It's not a bag, it's a Birkin!": history of an icon, the Birkin Bag by Hermès

Is it possible to have to join a long waiting list and wait years to be able to purchase a handbag? The answer seems to be yes, if that handbag is a Birkin. It happens just like that in a now well-known scene from the landmark series Sex and the City...
Read more...

"A splash of color on everyday color": Olivetti's Valentine typewriter

A bright, shiny red, a "Valentine red," is certainly the hallmark of the Valentine typewriter, designed in 1968 by Ettore Sottsass jr (Innsbruck, 1917 - Milan, 2007) and Perry King (London, 1938 - 2020) and produced by Olivetti in 1969. By this date,...
Read more...

Fendi's Baguette Bag: one bag, a thousand personalities

Two Fs mirroring each other are now the unmistakable logo of one of the world's best-known Italian fashion houses, Fendi. Designed by Karl Lagerfeld, the historic creative director of the Roman fashion house's Women's collection from 1965 until his d...
Read more...

The whole story of the Moleskine notebook, a book to write and a story to tell

"'Do you mind if I use my notebook?' 'Go ahead.' I pulled a waxed cloth-covered notebook out of my pocket, fastened with a rubber band. 'Nice.' He commented. 'I used to buy them in Paris, but they don't make them anymore.' 'In Paris?' he repeated, ar...
Read more...

Less is more: the Barcelona armchair by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

"Please do not [confuse] simple with easy, there is a big difference. I love simplicity because of its clarity, not because of its ease or for any other reason [...] To achieve clarity we have to simplify practically everything. It is hard work. One ...
Read more...

The Thonet Chair No. 14: the archetype of mass production

Six wooden slats, ten screws, two nuts; these were the elements needed to create one of the most innovative and popular design objects still in use today: the Chair No. 14, produced by Gebrüder Thonet Vienna. This chair, now known to design enth...
Read more...

The Grillo phone: a nice way to make a phone call

When, in 1965, Marco Zanuso (Milan, 1916 - 2001) and Richard Sapper (Munich, 1932 - Milan, 2015) designed the Grillo telephone, making a phone call was not always a simple and easy operation; in fact, it required a device consisting of two elements: ...
Read more...

Vico Magistretti's Atollo lamp: the difficulty of simplicity

"I was tired of seeing light always used in transparency. I wanted to use light with reflections..." From this intuition Vico Magistretti (Milan, 1920 - 2006) created one of the projects that still stands today as a symbol of that all-Italian design ...
Read more...