Italian Steel and Glass Sconces by Marco Zanuso for Oluce, 1950s, Set of 2

Italian architect-designer Marco Zanuso was born in Milan in 1916. After graduating from the Politecnico di Milano in 1939, he taught architecture, design, and town planning from the 1940s onwards. Zanuso opened his own architecture and design studio in Milan in 1945.

In the late 1940s, Zanuso began collaborating with Italian manufacturing company Arflex to create a furniture collection using a newly developed polyurethane foam and elastic tape. Guided by the principle that these new materials would inform the aesthetic result, Zanuso designed a series of pieces for Arflex that became icons of modernist design, including the Lady Armchair (1951)—which won the gold medal at Milan’s IX Triennale—the Sleep-o-matic Sofa (1951), the Martingala Armchair (1952), and the Fourline Armchair (1964).

Between 1957 and 1977, Zanuso maintained a partnership with German industrial designer Richard Sapper (1932-2015). Together they pioneered a new postwar aesthetic known as techno-functionalism, which evolved from a series of radios and televisions they designed. Successful designs by the pair include Lambda Chair for Gavina (1959), Doney 14 for Brionvega (1962)—the first fully-transistor television—the Grillo Telephone for Siemens (1966), and a series of mobile housing units for the landmark Italy: The New Domestic Landscape exhibition at MoMA in New York in 1972. Designs in Zanuso’s architectural repertoire include the Olivetti factory buildings in Buenos Aires and São Paulo (1955-57), the IBM factory buildings in Milan (1974), and the Piccolo Theater in Milan (1998).

As a designer who was dedicated to optimizing industriali production, Zanuso’s rationalist designs embrace experimental materials that are fully exploited to improve market accessibility. Characterized by bright colors, synthetic materials, and sculptural shapes, his work brought vanguard concepts to mass-produced consumer products. Notably, he also served as editor for both Domus and Casabella magazines. Winner of five Compasso d’Oro prizes between 1956 and 1985, Zanuso’s designs can be found in many permanent collections, including MoMA New York, the Triennale in Milan, and the Arflex Museum in Italy.

Zanuso passed away in Milan in 2001.

Founded in 1945 by Giuseppe Ostuni, Oluce is the oldest active lighting design company in Italy. Highly influential in the midcentury, Oluce helped pave the way for Italy’s international success in the lighting design sector while working with some of era’s brightest talents, including Joe Colombo, Bruno Gecchelin , Vico Magistretti, and Marco Zanuso.

Oluce first gained recognition after being represented in  well-regarded Domus magazine. Although the 1950s brought intense competition from a rising number of modernist, Italian lighting brands—such as Arredoluce, Arteluce, Azucena , Lamperti, and Stilnovo—Oluce established itself as a formidable postwar design force through a series of now iconic designs.

In 1951, Oluce debuted a lamp designed by architect-designer Franco Buzzi in the lighting exhibition curated by the Castiglioni brothers for Milan’s IX Triennale. In 1954, architect-designer Tito Agnoli (1931-2012) designed the groundbreaking and highly reduced Model 255/387 Agnoli Floor Lamp, which marked the beginning of a trend in shade-less lamps.

During the early 1960s, Oluce began collaborating with designer Joe Colombo (1930-1971), who was responsible for a number of highly successful Oluce lamps, including the Model 281 Acrilica Table Lamp (1962, Gold Medal Milan’s Triennial 1964); the weatherproof outdoor Fresnel Series (1964-66); Model 291 Spider Lamp (1965, Compasso d'Oro 1967), which also appeared in the 1972 MoMA exhibition Italy: The New Domestic Landscape; the Coupé Floor Lamp (1967, International Design Award 1968); Model 626 Alogena Floor Lamp (1970); and the Flash Lamp (1970s). After the premature death of Colombo in 1971, Oluce named their first indoor halogen light Colombo 626 (1972) in his honor.

Sometime during the early 1970s, the Verderi family gained control of Oluce. Around this time designer Vico Magistretti (1920-2006)—who was one of Italy’s most respected designers and a driving force in Italian design from the 1960s onwards—was appointed Art Director and chief designer, a position he maintained for many years. Iconic designs from Magistretti include the Dim 333 Floor Lamp (1975), Sonora Pendant (1976), the geometrically constructed Model 233 Atollo Table Lamp (1977, Compasso d’Oro 1979), and the Slalom Table Lamp (1981).

In 1992, Oluce hired the emergent Swiss designer Hannes Wettstein (1958-2008) as Art Director, followed by Marco Romanelli in 1995, who brought in a series international contemporary designers to update the company’s collections. Recent collaborators include designers Sebastian Bergne, Fernando and Humberto Campana, Toni Cordero, Toshiyuki Kita, Nendo, and Hans Peter Weidmann.

Many of Oluce’s designs have been acquired by important museums around the world, including MoMA New York,  in Munich, the Milan Triennale, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Kunstmuseum in Düsseldorf.

* Images courtesy of Oluce