Vintage 1980s Chairs Azucena Nonaro by Caccia Dominioni

Designer: Luigi Caccia Dominioni

Luigi Caccia Dominioni was born in Milan in 1913. He completed the entire cycle of studies, up to the Liceo Classico, at the Istituto Leone XIII in Milan, run by the Jesuits. In 1931 he enrolled in the Faculty of Architecture at the Milan Polytechnic. He graduated in 1936 and obtained the professional qualification in Venice. In 1936, with the brothers Livio and Piergiacomo Castiglioni, he opened a professional studio. He did his military service from 1939 to 1943, but refused to join the Social Republic of Salò and had to go to Switzerland. From 1945 he resumed his activity as an architect, first with his colleague Castiglioni, then, from 1946, with his own professional studio. In 1947 he dedicated himself to the production (Azucena) of furniture and design objects with the architect Ignazio Gardella. He mainly works on buildings in Milan and its province. He moved to the Principality of Monaco in 1975, where he built the Parc Saint Roman skyscraper.
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FineArt: Lamp 'LTE10'

Production: Azucena

That of the Azucena is a story born from the dialogue between producer, architect, artisans and customers. It all began in 1947, when a group of young Milanese - Luigi Caccia Dominioni, Corrado Corradi Dell'Acqua, Ignazio Gardella, Maria Teresa and Franca Tosi - decided to start the production of furniture designed by some of them in order to have a repertoire of ready-made furnishings, from sofas to handles, from tables to doorstops, for the homes they are planning. They are experimental furniture and objects that modify custom, contemplating the use without preconceptions of new materials, often combined with traditional ones in a completely surprising way. Even the realization is laborious and complex because their components are many and can come indifferently from industry or crafts. The lacquer, the polished chromed brass, the crystal reveal a constant search for luminosity, brilliance, transparencies, in materials as well as in finishes and colors, to escape from a conventional severe opacity. The furnishings are often called prosaically (Funnel, Boccia, Chrome bands, Ventola, Toro) to indicate, in a synthetic organicistic vision, a form, a constitutive principle; in other cases the names are taken from the toponym (Arenzano, Bordighera, Sant'Ambrogio or San Siro) used to designate the specific architecture that originally contained them and justified their design. At the base, therefore, of every single Azucena piece there is a particular architectural condition that it continues to reverberate, reproducing the echo of a reason for being.

Time: 1980s

1980s

Material: