Angelo Testa, the son of Italian immigrants, was born in 1918 in Springfield. Testa studied fine art painting and sculpture at the Chicago Institute of Design in the 1940s. In 1947, he set up Angelo Testa & Company, producing hand screen-printed and woven textiles for the many architectural studios of Chicago. Testa developed collaboration in textile design with several companies, including Schumacher's. He was interested in form and line and saw his work as being suited to the new minimal approach towards architecture.