Design Legend: Gio Ponti

Gio Ponti, born in Milan where he worked for his entire life, had an immense impact on architecture, design and art publishing both in Italy and throughout the world. One of the earliest of the Italian modern designers, Ponti helped to create a welcome, open environment for progressive art and design with his elegant and passionate work. Ponti was instrumental in the organization of the first Milan Triennials, and he became known for his architecture throughout the city. He believed that, “architecture is a fantasy of precisions.” His only public architecture project in the United States is the Denver Art Museum. His later designs are some of the most utilitarian and purely functional works he produced, and their innovative features were their wide, flat surfaces for laying down objects.

“My work does not contain critical or psychoanalytic elementsbecause architecture is already a fascinating scene, a celebration that millions of people are lucky enough to use and to admire.” – Ponti

Key Furniture Characteristics

•      Used both Rectilinear and Curvilinear Shapes in one space.
•      Employed both Craftsmanship and Industry.
•      Rationalism.
•      Functional and Spatial.

Original

Adaptation

Ponti’s original chair is wooden with a woven seat. The adaptation employs a similar structure made of bent metal and a plastic seat and back. The adaptation deleted the stretchers from the chair because they were no longer needed to support the legs. This is an adaptation towards a more minimalist design.