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Furniture designer Sergio Bicego produces works that merge luxury and comfort. Lavishly stuffed and sumptuously upholstered, each piece is inviting in its joining of function and beauty. He designs pieces that meet an ideal of form, instilled with elegant curves and smart lines, along with soft, serene colors, all adding tranquil energy to any space. His sofas epitomize the comfortable appeal of his creations, possessing an allure of ease and freedom from constraint.

Born in Italy in 1953, Bicego began his formal education with classical studies. He left school before graduation and found his way into the field of furniture upholstery. In learning the trade, Bicego became fascinated by the styles and shapes of furniture.

In 1991, Bicego established his furniture design studio. In 1993, he met Amelia Pegorin, owner of Saba Italia. In 1999, Saba Italia launched a line of sofas by Bicego. It became one of the company’s best sellers, remaining among its top items today.

Bicego has since designed many popular lines for Saba Italia and has collaborated with other design companies. In 2016, he created the Alcove model sofa for Alberta Made in Italy. Bicego continues to partner with top-name makers and create designs from his studio in San Martino di Lupari, Italy.

On 1stDibs, explore the luxurious comfort of Sergio Bicego chairs, loveseats, tables and more.

The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw sweeping social change and major scientific advances — both of which contributed to a new aesthetic: modernism. Rejecting the rigidity of Victorian artistic conventions, modernists sought a new means of expression. References to the natural world and ornate classical embellishments gave way to the sleek simplicity of the Machine Age. Architect Philip Johnson characterized the hallmarks of modernism as “machine-like simplicity, smoothness or surface [and] avoidance of ornament.”

Early practitioners of modernist design include the De Stijl (“The Style”) group, founded in the Netherlands in 1917, and the Bauhaus School, founded two years later in Germany.

Followers of both groups produced sleek, spare designs — many of which became icons of daily life in the 20th century. The modernists rejected both natural and historical references and relied primarily on industrial materials such as metal, glass, plywood, and, later, plastics. While Bauhaus principals Marcel Breuer and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe created furniture from mass-produced, chrome-plated steel, American visionaries like Charles and Ray Eames worked in materials as novel as molded plywood and fiberglass. Today, Breuer’s Wassily chair, Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona chair — crafted with his romantic partner, designer Lilly Reich — and the Eames lounge chair are emblems of progressive design and vintage originals are prized cornerstones of collections.

It’s difficult to overstate the influence that modernism continues to wield over designers and architects — and equally difficult to overstate how revolutionary it was when it first appeared a century ago. But because modernist furniture designs are so simple, they can blend in seamlessly with just about any type of décor. Don’t overlook them.