Vico Magistretti

An indus­trial designer, furni­ture designer, archi­tect and urban planner, Vico Magistretti was born in Milan. Heavily influ­enced by the human­ist work of his mentor, Ernesto Nathan Rogers, combined with the rebuild­ing needs after World War II, Magistretti built with human scale in mind. His archi­tec­tural work includes his involve­ment in the exper­i­men­tal neigh­bor­hood of QT8, where he designed a round church. His product design abil­i­ties led him to collab­o­ra­tions with Artemide, Cassina, De Padova, Flou, Fritz Hansen, Kartell and Schiffini. 

Magistretti’s decades-long collab­o­ra­tion with Cassina was built on exper­i­men­ta­tion, idea promo­tion, and working directly with arti­sans and produc­ers. Magistretti stated, ​“from the beginning…we worked together, in a way that is unique in the world…we discussed projects together from the start. I never produced finished designs…the design grew out of discus­sions, after looking at the tech­nol­ogy avail­able, the machines which the company used.” His work is still produced by Cassina to this day, includ­ing the Clar­i­tas Floor Lamp and the Maralunga 40 sofa.