Mid-Century Modern Furniture

The unique Murano chandelier Calla or Lily by Venini was made in Italy in the 1960s. Beautiful chandelier with glass flowers that seem to fall from a chrome stand. This lamp with its...

A cylinder shaped amber coloured pendant designed and produced by glass specialist Venini. This model is designed in the 1950s, but this is a more recent production. The lamp i...

The elegant Murano glass chandelier made in Italy in the 60s. Designer Toni Zuccheri for Venini & Co. Venini & Co. played a leading role in the revival of Italy’s high-end glass indu...

Stunning Murano glass chandelier designed by Venini for Kalmar, 1960s Two tiers gather many structured glasses, beautifully refracting the light very heavy quality. High quality and...

Italian Mid-Century Modern double Murano / Venetian glass pendant / flush mount by Venini The piece is composed of 2 hand blown Murano glass shades with inserted 1 inside the othe...

Vintage Italian flush mount or wall light with a single milky white Murano glass shade with brown border / Made in Italy by Venini, circa 1960s Measures: diameter 12 inches, height 5...

“Poliedri” chandelier designed by Carlo Scarpa and produced by the Italian manufacturer Venini in, 1958. Made of opaline Murano glass. Born in Venice on June 2nd, 1906, Carlo Scarpa began working at a very early age. Only a year after he had first qualified as an architect in 1926, he began working for the Murano glassmakers Cappellin & Co. in a consultative capacity; from 1927, he began to experiment with the Murano glass, and this research not only gave him excellent results here but would also inform his progress for many years to come. Between 1935 and 1937, as he entered his thirties, Carlo Scarpa accepted his first important commission, the renovation of Venice’s Cà Foscari. He adapted the spaces of this stately University building which stands on the banks of the Grand Canal, creating rooms for the Dean’s offices and a new hall for academic ceremonies; Mario Sironi and Mario De Luigi were charged with doing the restoration work on the frescos. After 1945, Carlo Scarpa found himself constantly busy with new commissions, including various furnishings and designs for the renovation of Venice’s Hotel Bauer and designing a tall building in Padua and a residential area in Feltre, which are all worth mention. One of his key works, despite its relatively modest diminished proportions, was the first of many works which were to follow in the nineteen fifties: the [bookshop known as the] Padiglione del Libro, which stands in Venice’s Giardini di Castello and shows clearly Scarpa’s passion for the works of Frank Lloyd Wright. In the years which were to follow, after he had met the American architect, Scarpa repeated similar experiments on other occasions, as can be seen, in particular, in the sketches he drew up in 1953 for villa Zoppas in Conegliano, which show some of his most promising work. However, this work unfortunately never came to fruition. Carlo Scarpa later created three museum layouts to prove pivotal in terms of how twentieth-century museums were to be set up from then on. Between 1955 and 1957, he completed extension work on Treviso’s Gipsoteca Canoviana [the museum that houses Canova’s sculptures] in Possagno, taking a similar experimental approach to the one he used for the Venezuelan Pavilion at [Venice’s] Giardini di Castello which he was building at the same time (1954-56). In Possagno Carlo Scarpa was to create one of his greatest ever works, which inevitably bears comparison with two other museum layouts that he was working on over the same period, those of the Galleria Nazionale di Sicilia, housed in the Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo (1953-55) and at the Castelvecchio in Verona (1957- 1974), all of which were highly acclaimed, adding to his growing fame. Two other buildings, which are beautifully arranged in spatial terms, can be added to this long list of key works that were started and, in some cases, even completed during the nineteen fifties. After winning the Olivetti award for architecture in 1956, Scarpa began work in Venice’s Piazza San Marco on an area destined to house products made by the Industrial manufacturers Ivrea. Over the same period (1959-1963), he also worked on renovation and restoration of the gardens and ground floor of the Fondazione Querini Stampalia in Venice, which many consider being one of his greatest works. While he busied himself working on-site at the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Carlo Scarpa also began work building a villa in Udine for the Veritti family. To shed some light on the extent to which his work evolved over the years, it may perhaps be useful to compare this work with that of his very last building, villa Ottolenghi Bardolino, which was near to completion at the time of his sudden death in 1978. Upon completion of villa Veritti over the next ten years, without ever letting up on his work on renovation and layouts, Scarpa accepted some highly challenging commissions which were to make the most of his formal skills, working on the Carlo Felice Theatre in Genoa as well as another theatre in Vicenza. Towards the end of this decade, in 1969, Rina Brion commissioned Carlo Scarpa to build the Brion Mausoleum in San Vito d’Altivole (Treviso), a piece he continued to work on right up until the moment of his death. Nevertheless, even though he was totally absorbed by work on this mausoleum, there are plenty of other episodes which can offer some insight into the final years of his career. As work on the San Vito d’Altivole Mausoleum began to lessen from 1973, Carlo Scarpa began work building the new headquarters for the Banca Popolare di Verona. He drew up plans that were surprisingly different from the work he was carrying out at the same time on the villa Ottolenghi. However, the plans Carlo Scarpa drew up, at different times, for a monument in Brescia’s Piazza della Loggia commemorating victims of the terrorist attack on May 28th, 1974, make a sharp contrast to the work he carried out in Verona, almost as if there is a certain hesitation after so many mannered excesses. The same Pietas that informs his designs for the Piazza Della Loggia can also be seen in the presence of the water that flows through the Brion Mausoleum, almost as if to give a concrete manifestation of pity in this twentieth-century work of art. Carlo Scarpa has put together a highly sophisticated collection of structures, occupying the mausoleum’s L-shaped space stretching across both sides of the old San Vito d’Altivole cemetery. A myriad of different forms and an equally large number of different pieces, all of which are separate and yet inextricably linked to form a chain that seems to offer no promise of continuity, rising up out of these are those whose only justification for being there is to bear the warning “si vis vitam, para mortem”, [if you wish to experience life prepare for death] as if to tell a tale that suggests the circle of time, joining together the commemoration of the dead with a celebration of life. At the entrance of the Brion Mausoleum stand the “propylaea” followed by a cloister which ends by a small chapel, with an arcosolium bearing the family sarcophagi, the main pavilion, held in place on broken cast iron supports, stands over a mirror-shaped stretch of water and occupies one end of the family’s burial space. The musical sound of the walkways teamed with the luminosity of these harmoniously blended spaces shows how, in keeping with his strong sense of vision, Carlo Scarpa could make the most of all of his many skills to come up with this truly magnificent space. As well as a great commitment to architectural work, with the many projects which we have already seen punctuating his career, Carlo Scarpa also made many equally important forays into the world of applied arts. Between 1926 and 1931, he worked for the Murano glassmakers Cappellin, later taking what he had learned with him when he went to work for the glassmakers Venini from 1933 until the 1950s. The story of how he came to work on furniture design is different, however, and began with the furniture he designed to replace lost furnishings during his renovation of Cà Foscari. The later mass-produced furniture started differently, given that many pieces were originally one-off designs “made to measure”. Industrial manufacturing using these designs as prototypes came into being thanks to the continuity afforded him by Dino Gavina, who, as well as this, also invited Carlo Scarpa to become president of the company Gavina SpA, later to become SIMON, a company Gavina founded 8 years on, in partnership with Maria Simoncini (whose own name accounts for the choice of company name). Carlo Scarpa and Gavina forged a strong bond in 1968 as they began to put various models of his into production for Simon, such as the “Doge” table, which also formed the basis for the “Sarpi” and “Florian” tables. In the early seventies, other tables that followed included “Valmarana”, “Quatour” and “Orseolo”. While in 1974, they added couch and armchair “Cornaro” to the collection and the “Toledo” bed...

VENINI - mid-century studio glass latticino 'handkerchief' vase - striking pink ribbons with copper aventurine edges - unsigned - Italy (Venice) - circa 1950. Excellent vintage co...

Mid-century organic modern round bowl in thick Murano glass, custom made for the Hotel des Bains in Venice, a pair is available, realized in ivory cream white glass paste, decorated ...

Wonderful 1950s single hand blown Italian exterior sconce by Venini. Soft white glass shade with a red and brown stripe with steel and brass hardware....

Blown glass, brass. Internally decorated blown glass shade. Brass mounts and 1 x E26 socket.

Beautiful vintage Murano hand blown dark blue, with light blue and white ribbons Italian art glass fazzoletto / handkerchief vase. Documented to designer Fulvio Bianconi for the Veni...

Murano, 1985, vase "Zanfirico Reticello". Colorless glass with blue-white thread decoration. Signed on the bottom: Venini Italia 1985.

Wonderful multi-level Murano Triedri glass chandelier from the 1960s by Venini. The chandelier brings a wonderful atmosphere to every room. A matching p...

Beautiful vintage well sized Murano hand blown glass bowl. The bowl is fashioned using the famous Sommerso technique, creating clear bubbles in champagne or caramel colour with gold flecks. This is most likely the work of the famous Venini glass foundry. This technique has been published in various Venini books. Created in the "a Bollicine...

Article: Murano glass bowl, ashtray element Producer: Venini glass, murano Origin: Murano, Italy Decade: 1970s This original glass shell bowl was produce...

Spectacular, dazzling, elegant, beautiful. All is little for this flush mount chandelier. Piece by Venini made up of a brass-plated base with chains from which hang 48 Venetian Tri...

Tobia Scarpa ‘Occhi’ bottle, Venini, Italy, 1960s. Colorless glass, red bordered murinne, arranged like a chessboard and merged. Quadrangular shape, roun...

Five small turquoise opaline hand blown bowls by Paolo Venini (1895-1959) circa 1950 for Venini, opaque glass, acid stamp to each 'Venini Murano Italia'. Dimensons; each height 1 1/...

Model 1329 in the 'Paris' colorway of red, blue, green, and hay yellow glass. One of Bianconi's major contributions to the art of glassmaking, the Pezzato series premiered at the 195...

In 1921 Venini and Cappellin opened a glass factory called Vetri Soffiati Muranesi Cappellin Venini & C. on the islands of M...

Stunning Venini midcentury Murano Triedri Chandelier. In a very desirable whale tail form. Features glass crystal prisms on polished steel frame. Takes 7 standard bulbs. Lead wire is...

Stunning and rare Murano ceiling lamp by Venini, 1960s. Off-white glass with a white decor. Details Creator: Venini, Murano Materials and Techniques: Brass, Murano Glass Width...

Chandelier "Esprit" in Murano hand blown glass and chrome metal. Designed by Toni Zuccheri and produced by Venini in the 1970s. Bibliography: - Domus 436 (marzo 1966), advertising...

Stunning monumental Italian Murano glass “Tronchi” chandelier by Venini and manufactured in Italy, circa 1970s. This chandelier has a capt...

Mid-Century Modern chandelier by Venini. 42 Murano glasses set on a metal base consisting of 2 tiers. The light has 7 bulbs. Details Creator: Venini, Murano Dimensions: Height...

Napoleone Martinuzzi, Bassotto Giallo (Yellow Dachsund) sculpture, white & gold Venini Murano 1930 Exceedingly rare example of a signed Venini large-scale Dachsund Dog Sculpture by N...

Article: Murano glass bowl element Producer: Venini Glass, Murano Origin: Murano, Italy Decade: 1970s These original vintage glass element was designe...

A hand blown orange colored glass Fungo table lamp designed by Massimo Vignelli at the start of his impressive career in design and executed by Murano glass specialist Venini. This is the largest size of the Fungo table lamp. The Fungo lamp...

Rare large Venini wall lights from the 1940s. Minimal patinated brass hardware with large tapered textured glass diffusers which have an iridescent coatin...

A hand-blown amber coloured glass Fungo table lamp designed by Massimo Vignelli at the start of his impressive career in design and executed by Murano glass specialist Venini. This is the medium high version. Please note that the last photo is only to indicate the size of the lamp; the lamp used there is actually a different (but also amber colored) lamp. The Fungo lamp...

Ceiling or Hanging lamp from the 'Membrane' series, designed by Toni Zuccheri and created between 1966 and 1968 by the famous Italian company Venini. The lamp presents a round sha...

In 1921 Venini and Cappellin opened a glass factory called Vetri Soffiati Muranesi Cappellin Venini & C. on the islands of Murano, the historic glass production centre in the lagoon of Venice, Italy. With Luigi Ceresa and Emilio Hochs as investors, they arranged to purchase the recently closed Murano glass factory of Andrea Rioda, hire the former firm's glassblowers, and retain Rioda himself to serve as technical director of the venture. Venini embarked on collaborations with architects and designers such as Cini Boeri, Tomaso Buzzi, Gio Ponti, Carlo Scarpa, Ettore Sottsass, Tapio Wirkkala, Gae Aulenti, and Massimo Vignelli. The ethos was to "take the Murano tradition of glass blowing and combine it with the French fashion industry's tradition of using designers". Here you can see a small lattimo vase "a mezza filigrana" realized by Venini on Carlo Scarpa...

Blown glass, brass. Internally decorated blown glass shade. Brass mounts and 1 x E26 socket.

Murano glass chandelier by Toni Zuccheri For Venini. Our unusual vintage Italian chandelier, pendant or lantern is comprised of...

Midcentury ORIGINAL modern signed Italian spiral chandelier manufactured by Venini Marked “VENINI SAS MURANO MADE IN ITALY” Multiple tiers of Italian Murano crystals cut into triang...

This pendant lamp was designed by Paolo Venini for Venini during the 1970s, in Italy. It features a brass plate were dozens of frosted glass drops fall creating a layering effect wit...

Vintage Acco vase by Alessandro Mendini for Venini, Murano 1997 A vintage art glass vase of the Acco series designed in 1988 by Alessandro Mendini for Venini, Venice. White opaque glass with a colorful overlay in red and a clear glass finish. With incised signature 'venini 97 A. Mendini' on the base and company lable on the body. A great example of the 1980s Italian Memphis Design. In 1921 Paolo Venini and Giacomo Cappellin founded a company that would become world famous. Under the artistic directions of Vittorio Zecchin the Vetri Soffiati Cappellin Venini & C. become the whiz kid of the golden 1920s. Over the decades, countless world-renowned artists like Napoleone Martinuzzi, Carlo Scarpa, Tomaso Buzzi, Fulvio Bianconi, Tuni Zuccheri, Thomas Stearns...

Venini Trilobo Murano glass and steel chandelier circa 1960 Made in Italy Will require four chandelier bulbs. Venini—the world famous Italian gl...

Cascade La Murrina Italian midcentury chandelier multicolor Murano glass.

Italian Mid-Century Modern design set of three scones wall lamps designed by Massimo Vignelli and produced by Venini with Murano adjustable glass diffusers and brass frame, Italy, 19...

Rare and early set of three Paolo Venini midcentury pendant lamps of slightly iridescent and textured Murano ice glass, Italy circa 1950s. The large lights...

Sculptural Italian chandelier from the famous house Venini dating from the 40/50s. Structures in white lacquered metal (original paint) and rectangular diffusers in transparent Muran...

An exceptional Mid- Century Modern oval chandelier by Venini ( Founded 1921 in Milan, Italy by Paolo Venini and Giacomo Cappellin). The stylish two-tiered chandelier features hand-blown Murano glass triede elongated prisms that dance in the light attached by two rods and rectangular ceiling...

A midcentury Venini "Fazzoletto" art glass vase designed by Fulvio Bianconi, Murano, Italy, circa 1950. Early execution by Venini, signed with three-line acid stamp Venini - Murano, ...

Vittorio Zecchin for Venini rare and exquisite 'Cesendello' pendant light, Italy, 1920s. This lovely original pendant is made with blown Murano glass in a soft chestnut brown color w...

“Poliedri” chandelier designed by Carlo Scarpa and produced by the Italian manufacturer Venini in, 1958. Made of opaline Murano glass. Born in Venice on June 2nd, 1906, Carlo Scarpa began working at a very early age. Only a year after he had first qualified as an architect in 1926, he began working for the Murano glassmakers Cappellin & Co. in a consultative capacity; from 1927, he began to experiment with the Murano glass, and this research not only gave him excellent results here but would also inform his progress for many years to come. Between 1935 and 1937, as he entered his thirties, Carlo Scarpa accepted his first important commission, the renovation of Venice’s Cà Foscari. He adapted the spaces of this stately University building which stands on the banks of the Grand Canal, creating rooms for the Dean’s offices and a new hall for academic ceremonies; Mario Sironi and Mario De Luigi were charged with doing the restoration work on the frescos. After 1945, Carlo Scarpa found himself constantly busy with new commissions, including various furnishings and designs for the renovation of Venice’s Hotel Bauer and designing a tall building in Padua and a residential area in Feltre, which are all worth mention. One of his key works, despite its relatively modest diminished proportions, was the first of many works which were to follow in the nineteen fifties: the [bookshop known as the] Padiglione del Libro, which stands in Venice’s Giardini di Castello and shows clearly Scarpa’s passion for the works of Frank Lloyd Wright. In the years which were to follow, after he had met the American architect, Scarpa repeated similar experiments on other occasions, as can be seen, in particular, in the sketches he drew up in 1953 for villa Zoppas in Conegliano, which show some of his most promising work. However, this work unfortunately never came to fruition. Carlo Scarpa later created three museum layouts to prove pivotal in terms of how twentieth-century museums were to be set up from then on. Between 1955 and 1957, he completed extension work on Treviso’s Gipsoteca Canoviana [the museum that houses Canova’s sculptures] in Possagno, taking a similar experimental approach to the one he used for the Venezuelan Pavilion at [Venice’s] Giardini di Castello which he was building at the same time (1954-56). In Possagno Carlo Scarpa was to create one of his greatest ever works, which inevitably bears comparison with two other museum layouts that he was working on over the same period, those of the Galleria Nazionale di Sicilia, housed in the Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo (1953-55) and at the Castelvecchio in Verona (1957- 1974), all of which were highly acclaimed, adding to his growing fame. Two other buildings, which are beautifully arranged in spatial terms, can be added to this long list of key works that were started and, in some cases, even completed during the nineteen fifties. After winning the Olivetti award for architecture in 1956, Scarpa began work in Venice’s Piazza San Marco on an area destined to house products made by the Industrial manufacturers Ivrea. Over the same period (1959-1963), he also worked on renovation and restoration of the gardens and ground floor of the Fondazione Querini Stampalia in Venice, which many consider being one of his greatest works. While he busied himself working on-site at the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Carlo Scarpa also began work building a villa in Udine for the Veritti family. To shed some light on the extent to which his work evolved over the years, it may perhaps be useful to compare this work with that of his very last building, villa Ottolenghi Bardolino, which was near to completion at the time of his sudden death in 1978. Upon completion of villa Veritti over the next ten years, without ever letting up on his work on renovation and layouts, Scarpa accepted some highly challenging commissions which were to make the most of his formal skills, working on the Carlo Felice Theatre in Genoa as well as another theatre in Vicenza. Towards the end of this decade, in 1969, Rina Brion commissioned Carlo Scarpa to build the Brion Mausoleum in San Vito d’Altivole (Treviso), a piece he continued to work on right up until the moment of his death. Nevertheless, even though he was totally absorbed by work on this mausoleum, there are plenty of other episodes which can offer some insight into the final years of his career. As work on the San Vito d’Altivole Mausoleum began to lessen from 1973, Carlo Scarpa began work building the new headquarters for the Banca Popolare di Verona. He drew up plans that were surprisingly different from the work he was carrying out at the same time on the villa Ottolenghi. However, the plans Carlo Scarpa drew up, at different times, for a monument in Brescia’s Piazza della Loggia commemorating victims of the terrorist attack on May 28th, 1974, make a sharp contrast to the work he carried out in Verona, almost as if there is a certain hesitation after so many mannered excesses. The same Pietas that informs his designs for the Piazza Della Loggia can also be seen in the presence of the water that flows through the Brion Mausoleum, almost as if to give a concrete manifestation of pity in this twentieth-century work of art. Carlo Scarpa has put together a highly sophisticated collection of structures, occupying the mausoleum’s L-shaped space stretching across both sides of the old San Vito d’Altivole cemetery. A myriad of different forms and an equally large number of different pieces, all of which are separate and yet inextricably linked to form a chain that seems to offer no promise of continuity, rising up out of these are those whose only justification for being there is to bear the warning “si vis vitam, para mortem”, [if you wish to experience life prepare for death] as if to tell a tale that suggests the circle of time, joining together the commemoration of the dead with a celebration of life. At the entrance of the Brion Mausoleum stand the “propylaea” followed by a cloister which ends by a small chapel, with an arcosolium bearing the family sarcophagi, the main pavilion, held in place on broken cast iron supports, stands over a mirror-shaped stretch of water and occupies one end of the family’s burial space. The musical sound of the walkways teamed with the luminosity of these harmoniously blended spaces shows how, in keeping with his strong sense of vision, Carlo Scarpa could make the most of all of his many skills to come up with this truly magnificent space. As well as a great commitment to architectural work, with the many projects which we have already seen punctuating his career, Carlo Scarpa also made many equally important forays into the world of applied arts. Between 1926 and 1931, he worked for the Murano glassmakers Cappellin, later taking what he had learned with him when he went to work for the glassmakers Venini from 1933 until the 1950s. The story of how he came to work on furniture design is different, however, and began with the furniture he designed to replace lost furnishings during his renovation of Cà Foscari. The later mass-produced furniture started differently, given that many pieces were originally one-off designs “made to measure”. Industrial manufacturing using these designs as prototypes came into being thanks to the continuity afforded him by Dino Gavina, who, as well as this, also invited Carlo Scarpa to become president of the company Gavina SpA, later to become SIMON, a company Gavina founded 8 years on, in partnership with Maria Simoncini (whose own name accounts for the choice of company name). Carlo Scarpa and Gavina forged a strong bond in 1968 as they began to put various models of his into production for Simon, such as the “Doge” table, which also formed the basis for the “Sarpi” and “Florian” tables. In the early seventies, other tables that followed included “Valmarana”, “Quatour” and “Orseolo”. While in 1974, they added couch and armchair “Cornaro” to the collection and the “Toledo” bed...

A Fazzoletto vase in green and light green opaline glass with clear glass overlay. It was manufactured in 2015 by Venini, Venice after a design of Fulvio Bianconi. On the base there ...

Laura Diaz de Santillana (b. 1955) for Venini rare Sommersi Oro vase from "Laura" series, Italy, 1993. This elegant hand-blown Murano glass vase is an exquisite blue color with gold ...

Beautiful small hanging lamp or lantern from Venini glass production in Italy in the 1950s. The glass is handmade and has regular white-blue stripes and a very nice shape. The color...

Large Vetro Sommerso Vase by Carlo Scarpa for Venini Murano, circa 1930s. A large vetro sommerso bollicine vase designed by Carlo Scarpa between 1934 a...

Rare Gio Ponti bottle for Venini designed in the 1950s from the Morandiana series. This example is a 1960s edition, acid-etched venini murano italia signature under the base, origina...

Small dish in green glass, Venini Murano ca. 1930s A small glass dish in transparent green glass, most probably designed by Carlo Scarpa. Manufacture...

Spectacular vintage Italian Venini Murano glass chandelier made of hand blown opaline and cream glass with 23 carat "polvero d'oro" throughout (gold leaf flecks). Exceptional quality...

Vintage Italian flush mount or wall light with a single milky white Murano glass shade with brown border / Made in Italy by Venini, circa 1960s Original mark on the frame Measures:...

Venini Bullicante bowl in vibrant ruby orange with gold foil inclusions by Carlo Scarpa circa 1950. Measures: 4" x 4" x 2" high. 1950s Italy.   

Marvelous Mid-Century Modern, stunning design, chrome & glass flowers fixture. This aesthetically pleasing and very rare design, Murano glass pendant is in good condition and read...

Carlo Scarpa Murano Glass Poliedri ceiling lamp for Venini in yellow and Grey, Italy 1950s.