O-Luce Linz Lamps Design V. Magistretti Glass Italy 1970s-1980s - 70s-80s

Designer: Vico Magistretti

Ludovico Magistretti (1920 - 2006) was an Italian designer and architect. Born into a middle-class Milanese family, Vico Magistretti attended the Parini classical high school and then enrolled in the Faculty of Architecture of the Royal Polytechnic of Milan, where leading figures in the architectural panorama of the time such as Gio Ponti and Piero Portaluppi taught. Between 1943 and 1944 he decided, like many intellectuals of the time, to leave his own country and moved to Switzerland where he was able to follow some academic courses. His acquaintance with Ernesto Nathan Rogers dates back to that period, and will remain in the architect's memory as a key person in his intellectual formation. In 1945 he returned to Milan, where he graduated in Architecture at the Polytechnic. In 1956 he was one of the founding members of ADI, the Association for Industrial Design. His latest design projects were presented at the Salone del Mobile in 2008. His design works are exhibited in the permanent collection of MOMA in New York and in other museums in America and Europe.
Find out more about Ludovico Magistretti with our insights:
Eclisse, light according to Vico Magistretti
Maralunga, the seat in motion
Corner Mix n ° 9

Production: O-Luce

Founded in 1945 by Giuseppe Ostuni, master of art, Oluce is, in the lighting field, the oldest Italian design company still active. Before the world war, in fact, there was only Arteluce by Gino Sarfatti, which disappeared at the end of the 90s, Azucena and Lamperti were born in 1948, and Arredoluce and Stilnovo in 1950. However, it was above all Arteluce, Azucena and Oluce that focused, for many years, on the Italian panorama, establishing themselves as meeting centers for those designers who, strongly involved first with the reconstruction and then with the birth of mass production, animated the Milanese debate: Vittoriano Viganò and the BBPR, Gigi Caccia Dominioni and Ignazio Gardella, Marco Zanuso and finally Joe Colombo. Already in 1951 Oluce successfully participated in the IX Triennale. A great success was confirmed by Tito Agnoli with the mention of two lamps (the floor model 363 and a special model for bookcases) in the second edition of the Compasso d'Oro, in 1955. In 1956, two other reports followed in rapid sequence: for a very notable table lamp in polyvinyl with slats and for a pendant luminaire (mod. 4461) with double Perspex diffuser. Finally, it is essential to remember, in 1954, the 255/387 luminaire (called ''Agnoli''), a slender rod holding a spot, marking the end of lampshades and the adoption of very simplified floor lamps also in domestic lighting . Meanwhile, in 1963, in production since 1965, Marco Zanuso designed a forgotten masterpiece for Oluce, the model 275 table lamp with a large white Perspex diffuser that can be rotated on a lacquered metal base. In 1964/66, again from a material, the printed glass called ''Fresnel Lens'', with Joe Colombo, the family of ''Fresnel'' waterproof outdoor lamps with painted metal base and diffuser held by clips was born. 'steel. In 1967, however, Colombo was already further ahead and, with the ''Coupé'' model, preserved at the MoMA in New York, proposed a curved stem of considerable size to support a very elegant semi-cylindrical cap. In 1968, the Coupé won the ''International Design Award'' from the American Institute of Interior Designers in Chicago. Finally, in 1970, which went into production in 1972, one year after the premature death of Joe Colombo, the ''Halogen lamp'' was born, necessarily called ''Colombo'' ever since. In 2001, white Murano glass stones and cane rods transparent perspex populate the Oluce stand at Euroluce. Designed by Laudani&Romanelli and Ferdi Giardini, they propose a way of understanding design that goes beyond function to become poetry. Finally, Oki Sato, or Nendo, the most refined of the new Japanese designers, joins the Oluce team, first with ''Sorane'' and then with ''Switch''. But this is no longer the story of Oluce, but rather Oluce's contribution to contemporary design. -

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