Italian architect, designer, teacher and urban planner Angelo Mangiarotti was a leading light in the international design community from the 1960s onward. While he was an adherent of the rationalist principles of purity of line and simplicity of construction, he sought to imbue his designs for coffee tables, dining chairs, sconces and other furnishings with a sense of character and lightness of spirit that was often lacking in late-20th-century modernist architecture and design.
Born in Milan, Mangiarotti studied architecture at Milan Polytechnic, graduating in 1948. Five years later, he won a visiting professorship at the Illinois Institute of Technology — beginning a peripatetic academic career that would see him teaching in numerous Italian institutions as well as in schools as far afield as Hawaii and Australia. He worked with Bauhaus eminences Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and met such greats as Frank Lloyd Wright and Walter Gropius. He returned to Italy in 1955 and would go on to work on numerous industrial, residential, commercial and civic projects in his home country, most notably a group of six railway stations in Milan.
As a designer, Mangiarotti and the development of his career embodies the evolution of modernism in the latter decades of the 20th century. In the late 1950s and early ’60s, after early experiments in plywood furniture and one-piece foam-core seating — including the 1110 lounge chair for Cassina — Mangiarotti began to design using more classic materials, from delicate, curvaceous blown-glass table lamps for Artemide to chandeliers with crystal links for Vistosi.
In 1971, Mangiarotti introduced what became his signature designs: a series of tables in marble and other stones that featured “gravity joints,” their legs held in place by the weight of the tabletop. Tables in his Eros collection have muscular proportions that anticipate the robust, overscaled lines of postmodern works that would appear 10 years later: His Eccentrico table, for example, is a striking assemblage in marble featuring a top that is cantilevered dramatically on a canted columnar base.
But simplicity and practicality were consistently the primary watchwords of Mangiarotti’s designs. The purity and elegance of the objects he created offer a graceful counterpoint to a traditional decor, yet they have a singular sculptural presence that allows them to stand out powerfully in a modern interior.
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Modern Italian Lighting Sfera Model by Angelo Mangiarotti for Skipper, 1970
By Skipper, Angelo Mangiarotti
Located in Asti, Piemonte
Beautiful table lamp Sfera in Murano glass and chromed metal designed by Angelo Mangiarotti and produced by Skipper in circa 1970. Biography ANGELO MANGIAROTTI was born in Milan on ...
Metal
Table Lamp Polluce Collection by Angelo Mangiarotti for Skipper, Italy
By Skipper, Angelo Mangiarotti
Located in Asti, Piemonte
Table lamp by Angelo Mangiarotti, Polluce Collection for Skipper, Italy, Mazzega Murano, circa 1970. Biography ANGELO MANGIAROTTI was born in Milan on 26th of February 1921. He grad...
Murano Glass
Table Lamp Il Cammino Model by Angelo Mangiarotti for Iter Elettronica, Italy
By Angelo Mangiarotti
Located in Asti, Piemonte
The Il Cammino floor lamp was designed in 1972 by Angelo Mangiarotti for Iter Elettronica. It is made of opaline glass with a chrome base. Through a touch-sensitive switch, this ligh...
Metal
Table Lamp Nessa Model by Gino Vistosi for Vetrerie Vistosi, Italy
By Vistosi, Gino Vistosi
Located in Asti, Piemonte
Nessa table lamp in Murano glass by Gino Vistosi for Vistosi, 1970s. The Nessa table lamp is a design product created by Gino Vistosi for the Vistosi ...
Murano Glass
Important Large Lamp Bulbo Model by Aureliano Toso Murano 1960-70
By Aureliano Toso
Located in Asti, Piemonte
Important large table lamp designed by Aureliano Toso, Bulbo Model, Murano, 1960-70 This monumental lamp it is composed of glasses s mounted on a chromed metal structure . Perfect conditions. Aureliano Toso one of the best glassworks together with Venini and Barovier & Toso Biography The glass factory was founded in 1938 by Aureliano Toso who, from the beginning, made use of the collaboration of the painter Dino Martens, whose qualities he had already appreciated as a designer. The first relevant experiments, at a research level, appear at the XXII Biennale in 1942, with a series of glass in contrasting colored bands and one of thick spiral-shaped glass with polychrome inclusions. In 1948 he created one of the most significant pieces, "The Magician's Bottle", exhibited at the Historical Exhibition of Murano Glass and in the 1952 Biennale, anticipating the successful "Oriente" series. For the first time, glass was used like any other medium through which an artist could express himself. From 1946 to 1960 Dino Martens designed an incredible series of pieces for Toso, mostly unique or in limited editions, with which, using traditional techniques, he was able to obtain very new polychrome effects, combined with extremely daring and difficult to execute asymmetrical shapes. In this research the artist was greatly helped by the owner who supported him by providing him with considerable means and the collaboration of some of the best masters of the island such as the famous Aldo Bon "Polo", Mario Zanetti and Silvano Simioni. The Vetreria participated in the most important events in Italy and abroad, enjoying great critical success, confirmed by the assignment of various prizes, including the gold medal at the Milan Triennale in 1951. For a short time Italian and foreign artists collaborated, we remember Fioravante Seibezzi, Aldo Bergamini and Jan Le Witt...
Murano Glass
Murano Glass Table Lamp Ghost Model by Angelo Mangiarotti for Skipper, Italy
By Angelo Mangiarotti, Skipper
Located in Asti, Piemonte
Ghost lamp by Angelo Mangiarotti, Polluce collection for Skipper, Italy, Mazzega Murano, circa 1970. With original label. Biography ANGELO MANGIAROTTI was born in Milan on 26th of F...
Murano Glass
