In the final of our series that celebrates International Women’s Day through the work of world-renowned designers, More Space explores the design catalogues of four design studios based in Milan: Ellen Bernhardt and Paola Vella of Bernhardt-Vella, Chiara Andreatti and Patricia Urquiola’s Studio Urquiola.
Designer Chiara Andreatti was born in Veneto near Venice and moved to Milan to study industrial design before finishing a masters in design at the Domus Academy. It was the rigorous Milanese training that opened the door to the studios of Raffaella Mangiarotti and Renato Montagner, before she joined designer Piero Lissoni and his legendary Lissoni Associati, a multifaceted design powerhouse where careers are forged. Working with Lissoni and some of the world’s most prestigious brands, Andreatti has simultaneously established her name as a freelance designer and now collaborates on furniture, glassware, lighting and rugs with clients from Glas Italia and Gebrüder Thonet Vienna, to Paola C, Fendi Casa, Armani Jeans and Ichendorf Milan.
In the work of Chiara Andreatti, her Venetian roots express Italy’s artisan culture and precision, and the understanding that the ‘handcrafted and poetic touch on everyday objects will enrich our lives’. Research is key to each collection that she describes as ‘elegant, balanced and authentic,’ the breadth of projects ranging from refined and minimal, to warm, textural and viscerally crafted.
Winning the IF Design Award for the Loïe armchair made in collaboration with Austrian manufacturer Gebrüder Thonet Vienna, the design embraces the group’s rich history working with bentwood and cane, a process that informs other works too, including the Suzenne sofa and armchair. Taking that approach to glass, the Twinkle table for Glas Italia is inspired by Bohemian glassmaking and the traditional skills of glass grinding. Two hollow volumes, a rhombus and a triangle, blend with axonometric lines that are ground under the surface. It’s this craft-based approach to design that reveals the richness of materials and manufacturing found in all of Andreatti's work.
Vela screen designed by Ellen Bernhardt and Paola Vella for Arflex. Photo c/o Arflex.
Suzenne armchair designed by Chiara Andreatti for Gebrüder Thonet Vienna GmbH. Photo c/o Gebrüder Thonet Vienna GmbH.
German designer Ellen Bernhardt and Italian interior designer Paola Vella joined forces in 2008. Describing their design as holding a ‘serene and discreet elegance,’ the duo creates furniture, lighting, kitchens and bathrooms with a systems approach that is highly ergonomic and all about the detail. ‘From lights to chairs, living systems, bathroom and kitchen, we have translated it into purity: the balance of lines and shapes, lightness and airiness,’ remark the designers. ‘Probably our more feminine side translates into a sweet, soft, but also contemporary, pragmatic sign’.
Now based in Milan, research is always the starting point with ideas drawn from the past and translated into contemporary form. ‘When we start to think of a new project, we think of it by projecting it into a hypothetical space. Working often on projects of different scale… We like to create surprising contrasts: experimenting with colour in all its facets, neon light with antique paintings, precious fabrics with industrial resin, and antique furniture with extravagant plants.’
Highlights from a body of work embrace often simple materials that are crafted with precious, delicate details. A long relationship working within the rich history of Italian furniture group Arflex, the collection includes the Scales table, a design inspired by stone, its thin round top contrasted by a sculptural scaled base defined by its intentional, marked detail. While the Alba storage system and the Papillon light express richly layered meaning.
Husk sofa designed by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia. Photo c/o B&B Italia.
And finally, the designer Patricia Urquiola who was born in Oviedo, Spain, moved to Milan as a student at the Politecnico di Milano, graduated under the mentorship of one of the world’s design legends, Achille Castiglioni, and honed her craft in the studio of Lissoni Associati. Urquiola’s ‘empathic connection with the user’ is drawn from experience working and teaching with Castiglioni whose ‘fundamental element’ shapes every project. It was also Castiglioni’s interest in the potential between craftsmanship and industrial research that pushes Urquiola's work beyond the ‘limits of what has already experimented,’ and informs projects from houses, hotels, yachts, furniture, lighting and objects, to innovative design solutions for the future of mobility, workplace and production cycles.
Shimmer tables for Glas Italia designed by Patricia Urquiola. Photo c/o Glas Italia.
Alba shelving system, here and following, by Ellen Bernhardt and Paola Vella for Arflex. Photo c/o Arflex.
The Loie chair designed by Chiara Andreatti for Gebrüder Thonet Vienna GmbH. Photo c/o Gebrüder Thonet Vienna GmbH.
Tufty-Time sofa designed by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia. Photo c/o B&B Italia.
LA Sunset, here and following, designed by Patricia Urquiola for Glas Italia. Photo c/o Glas Italia.
Bend sofa by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia. Photo c/o B&B Italia.
Husk sofa designed by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia. Photo c/o B&B Italia.
‘Exploring the mind of Patricia Urquiola offers many surprises, among them, discovering the unexpected themes that feed her voracious curiosity: virtual reality, economy, politics, artificial intelligence, the theory of colour, the Anthropocene, robotics, ecology and sustainability, gender issues, man and machines.’
Ana Dominguez Siemens, Curator, ‘Patricia Urquiola. Nature Morte Vivante’
Bisel low tables designed by Patricia Urquiola for Glas Italia. Photo c/o Glas Italia.
At the Madrid Design Festival in 2020 an exhibition entitled ‘Patricia Urquiola. Nature Morte Vivante’ focused on different stages of her career, laid out around five pillars exploring recurrent themes and the designer’s mindset. ‘Exploring the mind of Patricia Urquiola offers many surprises, among them, discovering the unexpected themes that feed her voracious curiosity: virtual reality, economy, politics, artificial intelligence, the theory of colour, the Anthropocene, robotics, ecology and sustainability, gender issues, man and machines,’ explains curator Ana Dominguez Siemens.
Working with a team of 70; architects, interior designers, product, textile designers and model makers, Urquiola describes the studio as an ‘international community’ of 18 nationalities who collaborate in ‘the most interrelated possible way’. It’s here in the designer’s Milanese headquarters where projects for furniture makers B&B Italia, Kartell, Glas Italia, Flos, Serralunga, Bosa and Viccarbe are developed and international accolades forged, from the Gold Medal in Fine Arts awarded by the Spanish Government, Order of Isabella the Catholic, awarded by His Majesty The King of Spain Juan Carlos I, to ‘Designer of the decade’ awards from German magazines Home and Häuser. As prolific as the work Urquiola and her team produce, it is the seemingly endless stream of ideas, at once disparate and connected, familiar and surprising, that deftly and deeply reflect the zeitgeist of our time.
B&B Italia, Flos, Viccarbe, Glas Italia, Arflex, Serralunga, Bosa and Kartell are available exclusively in South East Asia from Space – Singapore and Malaysia.
