The Triennale Design Museum, Triennale di Milano and the Monza and Brianza Chamber of Commerce have inaugurated the Permanent Collection of Italian Design in the Belvedere rooms of the Royal Villa of Monza. It is a selection of pieces called to represent and promote Italian design in Italy and throughout the world, among which the Foglia chair, designed by Marco Ferreri for Billiani, unquestionably stands out.
Foglia represents a constant force towards exploration, a challenge whose greatest expression can be found in the many possibilities of the material and in their combination and recombination. It is a revolution in the field of chairs thanks to a building system that allows the chair to be made of lightness: visual and physical lightness. A fine plywood shell without a crossbar rests smoothly on a solid wood frame (oak or beech). The Legnocuoio seat held under tension and the backrest thus create a thin continuous surface made up of a sheet of wood which, against the light, visibly reveals its very reduced thickness and translucency.
After being shortlisted for the Red Dot Award and for the ADI Design Index in 2002, and having received the CATAS Award for technological innovation in the same year, the Foglia design has been a source of inspiration for many imitators, becoming a typological icon. This is confermed by the way it now pleasantly and naturally integrates into the Triennale Design Museum’s Permanent Collection of Italian Design.
Available in chair and stool versions of different sizes and in oak or natural beech versions, bleached or treated with tobacco oak or wenge, or lacquered in 12 different colours, Foglia is sophisticated and fresh at the same time.
The Triennale Design Museum collection comprises over 1,000 pieces, in addition to a collection of models by Giovanni Sacchi, a collection of drawings by Alessandro Mendini, The Sign of Designers collection of drawings, the Clino Castelli Color Library, the Nanni Strada Archive, a wealth of drawings by Sirio Galli, and the virtual collection of all the objects of the seven editions of the Triennale Design Museum available on Pinterest.
A selection of over 200 iconic items was presented in Monza, bearing witness to the innovation, experimentation and diversification of the history of Italian design. The exhibition is organized chronologically from the 1950s to the present day, alternating the works of great masters – from Gio Ponti, Piero Fornasetti and Franco Albini to Bruno Munari, Alessandro Mendini and Achille Castiglioni – with those of young new designers.
The exhibition design by Michele De Lucchi, who restored the Belvedere rooms and was the architect in charge of restoring the Triennale and the permanent spaces of the Triennale Design Museum, has a very clean design and showcases a body of items that are among the most representative in terms of formal and technological innovation applied to products.
For more info about Billani, visit www.billani.it