Crafting Design in Italy

Crafting Design in Italy
Author: Catharine Rossi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 219
Release: 2015
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780719089404

Crafting design in Italy is the first book to examine the role that craft played in the history of post-war Italian design, one the most celebrated episodes in twentieth century design. Craft was vital to the development of design in Italy from 1945 to the 1980s, and yet as often as this storyhas been told, it is incomplete. Missing is the overlooked but multiple role that craft played - as a method of manufacture, set of disciplines and traditions, materials and ideas.This book examines the multiple ways that craft shaped Italian design from 1945 to 1981. It is organised in four chapters, each of which focus the different ways that Italy's architects engaged with craft in the context of the bigger socio-economic, cultural and political changes of the period, fromthe imperatives of post-war reconstruction to the explosion in luxury in the economic "miracle" of the 1960s, to the experimentation of Radical Design and the postmodern adventures of Studio Alchimia and Memphis. It uses a series of case studies on design areas including product, furniture, fashion,glass and ceramics to bring to light previously unknown makers and objects as well as re-examine design "icons" such as Gio Ponti's Superleggera chair and Ettore Sottsass's Carlton bookcase. This project uses the concept of craft to offer a radical re-reading of post-war Italian design. It also setsout to provide a paradigm for using craft-based approaches and analysing design and craft's relationship in other cultures and contexts.

A New History of "Made in Italy"

A New History of
Author: Lucia Savi
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2023-01-26
Genre: Design
ISBN: 1350247766

In the first book to examine the role played by textile manufacturing in the development of fashion in Italy, A New History of 'Made in Italy' investigates Italy's transition from a country of dressmakers, tailors and small-scale couturiers in the early post-Second World War period to a major producer of ready-to-wear fashion in the 1980s. It takes the reader from Italy's first internationally attended fashion show in 1951 to Time magazine's Giorgio Armani April 1982 cover story, which signalled the fashion designer's international arrival, and Milan's presence as the capital of ready-to-wear. Chapters focus for the first time on the material substance of Italian fashion – textile – looking at questions including the importance of manufacturing quality, design innovation, composition, production techniques, commerce and the role of textile on the country's overall fashion system. Through these, Lucia Savi brings to light the importance of synthetic fibres, previously little-known players, such as the carnettisti (a type of textile wholesalers) as well as re-investigating well-known couturiers and designers such as Simonetta, Gianfranco Ferré and Gianni Versace. By looking at how things are made, by whom, and where, this book seeks to unpack the 'Made in Italy' label through a focus on making. Informed by extensive archival materials retrieved from a wide range of sources, it brings together the often-separated disciplines of fashion, textile and design history.

Made in Italy

Made in Italy
Author: Grace Lees-Maffei
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2013-11-21
Genre: Design
ISBN: 1472558421

Goods made or designed in Italy enjoy a profile which far outstrips the country's modest manufacturing output. Italy's glorious design heritage and reputation for style and innovation has 'added value' to products made in Italy. Since 1945, Italian design has commanded an increasing amount of attention from design journalists, critics and consumers. But is Italian design a victim of its own celebrity? Made in Italy brings together leading design historians to explore this question, discussing both the history and significance of design from Italy and its international influence. Addressing a wide range of Italian design fields, including car design, graphic design, industrial and interior design and ceramics, well-known designers such as Alberto Rosselli and Ettore Sottsass, Jr. and iconic brands such as Olivetti, Vespa and Alessi, the book explores the historical, cultural and social influences that shaped Italian design, and how these iconic designs have contributed to the modern canon of Italian-inspired goods.

Masterpieces of Italian Design

Masterpieces of Italian Design
Author: Charlotte Fiell
Publisher: Goodman
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2013
Genre: Art and design
ISBN: 9781847960474

Masterpieces of Italian Design is an overview of the past two centuries in Italian design and manufacturing. This new title documents the 110 most pioneering designs to come out of Italy, and explains why, with stunning images (including rare archival photographs, illustrations and patent drawings) and explanatory texts.

Memory, Mobility, and Material Culture

Memory, Mobility, and Material Culture
Author: Chiara Giuliani
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 259
Release: 2022-11-18
Genre: History
ISBN: 1000798461

With a focus on the object and where it is situated, in time (memory) and space (mobility), Memory, Mobility, and Material Culture embodies a multidisciplinary and cross-disciplinary approach. The chapters track the movement of the objects and their owner(s), within and between continents, countries, cities, and families. Objects have always been considered with an eye to their worth – economic, aesthetic, and/or functional. If that worth is diminished, their meaning and value disappear, they are just things. Yet things can still fulfil functions in our daily lives; they hold symbolic potential, from personal memory triggers, to focal points of public ritual and religion; from collectors’ obsession, to symbols of loss, displacement, and violence. By bringing into dialogue the work of specialists in ethnology, art history, architecture, and design; literature, languages, cultures, and heritage studies, this volume considers how displaced memory – the memory of refugees, migrants, and their descendants; of those who have moved from the countryside to the city; of those who have faced personal upheaval and profound social change; those who have been forced into exile or experienced major personal or collective loss – can become embodied in material culture. This book is important reading to those interested in cultural and social history and cultural studies.

Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum

Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum
Author: Magdalena Buchczyk
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2023-04-20
Genre: Design
ISBN: 1350226742

Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum delves into the history and the changing material culture in Europe through the stories of a basket, a carpet, a waistcoat, a uniform, and a dress. The focus on the objects from the collection of the Museum of European Cultures in Berlin offers an innovative and challenging way of understanding textile culture and museums. The book shows that textiles can be simultaneously used as the material object of research, and as a lens through which we can view museums. In doing so, the book fills a major gap by placing textile knowledge back into the museum. Each chapter focuses on one object story and can be read individually. Swooping from 19th-century wax figure cabinets, Nazi-era collections, Cold War exhibitions in East and West Berlin, and institutional reshuffling after German unification, it reveals the dramatically changing story of the museum and its collection. Based on research with museum curators, makers and users of the textiles in Italy and Germany, Poland and Romania, the book provides intimate insights into how objects are mobilised to very different social and political effects. It sheds new light on movements across borders, political uses of textiles by fascist and communist regimes, the objects' fall into oblivion, as well as their heritage and tourist afterlives. Addressing this complex museum legacy, the book suggests new pathways to prefigure the future. Featuring new archival and ethnographic research, evocative examples and images, it is an essential read for students of textile and material culture, museum and curatorial studies as well as anyone interested in history, heritage and craft.

Domus

Domus
Author: Oberto Gili
Publisher: Rizzoli Publications
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2016-10-11
Genre: House & Home
ISBN: 0847849279

An insider’s tour of the most creative and inspiring rooms belonging to tastemakers—artists, interior designers, craftspeople, collectors, and aristocrats—in Italy today. Italy has been a source of inspiration for generations of artists and lovers of beauty. In this book, Italians Oberto Gili and Marella Caracciolo Chia take us around the country and into the homes of some of its most stylish habitués. From rural estates in Tuscany and spectacular seaside villas to an eighteenth-century palace in Puglia and city residences in Turin, Milan, Venice, Rome, and Naples, the properties reveal the unique personal visions of the owners and the inescapable appeal of Italian style. The diversity of places echoes the wide range of geographical contexts. Each interior acts as a source of surprise and an impetus for creativity, reflecting the individual tastes and talents of those who live and have lived there—designer Carlo Mollino, couturier Stephan Janson, art and literary scholar Mario Praz, and artists Sandro Chia and Alessandro Twombly. In addition to the houses of artists and craftspeople, rooms of visionary interior designers, such as Camilla Guinness, Roberto Peregalli, and Laura Sartori Rimini, are also included. This book—an intimate glimpse into some of the most beautiful and inaccessible dwellings in Italy today—is perfect for aesthetically minded readers with an interest in interior design, Italy, and the art of fine living.

The Persistence of Craft

The Persistence of Craft
Author: Paul Greenhalgh
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2003
Genre: Art
ISBN: 9780813532646

In The Persistence of Craft, contributors discuss the development of not only six specific crafts--glass, ceramics, jewelry, wood, textiles, and metal--but also the trends and movements that have helped shape their developments. Includes 180 full-color illustrations.

The Golden Dawn of Italian Fashion

The Golden Dawn of Italian Fashion
Author: Rosanna Masiola
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 247
Release: 2020-07-06
Genre: Design
ISBN: 1527555755

This is the first book written about Maria Monaci Gallenga (1880-1944), the enigmatic fashion artist and designer marginalized after decades of fortune and fame. The daughter of Ernesto Monaci, the illustrious philologist and mentor of Luigi Pirandello, Gallenga was the wife of Pietro Gallenga, a medical scientist related to the Gallenga Stuart family. The text outlines Maria Monaci Gallenga’s impact on the world of fashion, contextualizing her work and that of other forgotten fashion designers in the 1920s and 1930s. It sheds light on her cultural impact and idealism as a business entrepreneur in Europe and America promoting Italian art and culture. It also highlights her engagement in social and educational activities after she retired from the world of fashion, and explains the reasons behind her marginalization and disappearance, and the obstacles and constraints she faced during the years of Fascism. The book also considers the influence of the British arts and crafts movement and the vision of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood on her aesthetic vision, and, in turn, investigates Maria Gallenga’s influence on late Pre-Raphaelite paintings (Frank Cadogan Cowper) inspired by her designs and fabrics. The discovery of her fabrics and accessories by the Fendi sisters in the collections of the Tirelli House eventually sparked a new interest in her models, now enhanced by digital media.

Designing Modern Britain

Designing Modern Britain
Author: Cheryl Buckley
Publisher: Reaktion Books
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2007-10
Genre: Design
ISBN: 9781861893222

Employing numerous examples of classic British design, Designing Modern Britain delves into the history of British design culture, and thereby tracks the evolution of the British national identity.