The initial idea for the Vegetal chair in 2004 was to create a piece of furniture that appeared as if it had grown naturally, like a plant. For inspiration, its designers, the French brothers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, looked to historic furniture that integrated a sense of organic growth: English garden chairs constructed in boughs of cast iron; ... See more

Haughty and imposing, Hyatt by Ettore Sottsass suggests the structure of a classical column, with a “capital” equal at the base. It is an object that does not go unobserved, due to its opulence and the use of fine materials like briar. Hyatt relies on the masterful interaction of cylindrical forms with a symmetrical silhouette shaped by the identic... See more

There are craftsmen with extraordinary savoir-faire. This is one of the treasures of the world, this savoir-faire, and some people are trained in it, and it’s produced in small quantities at a certain price. The price is fact—I can do nothing about it. I don’t want a world in which everything is built by robots or machines. However, In my kitchen, ... See more

He was a creator in the true sense, bringing new ideas and sensibility to life; it’s rare to do that over so many decades. His legacy is still undigested because he kept reinventing himself. He responded to what he saw around him and worked with the new materials and technologies introduced during his lifetime. With some historical references only ... See more

“This is what I learned from Italian designers: the wish for a better world in mass production, and the wish for a world of diversity from craft, and how to find the treasure in all of this.” – Ronan Bouroullec

Great artists don’t study art history to figure out what art to create. Great founders don’t analyze the market to figure out what product to build.