Exploring the captivating archives of Fondazione Castiglioni•
Achille Castiglioni was an iconic Italian architect and designer of furniture, lighting, radiograms and several other objects. In March 1944 he graduated from the Politecnico di Milano; following the war, Castiglioni joined the architectural design practice that his brothers Livio and Pier Giacomo had started with Luigi Caccia Dominioni in 1938. Much of their work was in exhibition design, but they also carried out a number of architectural projects, including the reconstruction in 1952–53 of the Palazzo della Permanente, which had been destroyed by bombing in 1943.
Livio Castiglioni left the practice in 1952. From then until Pier Giacomo died in 1968, Achille and worked as a team, exploring Marcel Duchamp’s concept of the “ready-made” by incorporating and repurposing existing objects into new designs. After the death of Pier Giacomo, Castiglioni worked alone.
Together with Pier Giacomo, in 1957 he designed “Sella” and “Mezzadro” stools for Zanotta, as well as the “Cubo” couch for Arflex. In 1959, they began working with Kartell, designing lighting and furniture, including a collection of tables and stools called “Rochetto”. The Castiglioni brothers designed the “Lierna” chair for Cassina, and the “Taraxacum” chandelier for Flos in 1960. Also for Flos, in 1962 they designed both the “Toio” lamp, assembled from “ready-made” surplus hardware, and the “Arco” lamp, consisting of a long-arched stainless-steel cantilevered support, an adjustable shade made of perforated spun aluminium, and a heavy marble base. These projects were followed in 1964 by the “Splüghen Braü” pendant light, and the “RR 126” radiogram for Brionvega.
From 1969 he taught architectural and design subjects, first at the Politecnico di Torino, and then, from 1980, at the Politecnico di Milano. As a professor of design, he advised his students, “If you are not curious, forget it. If you are not interested in others, what they do and how they act, then being a designer is not the right job for you.” Throughout his lifetime, Castiglioni received many awards and distinctions for his designs, including 8 x Compasso d’Oro, as well as the Compasso d’Oro Career Award “for having raised design to the highest values of culture through his irreplaceable experience.” His designs are held in museum collections around the world, and several books have been published about his life and work.
In 1997, the MoMA in New York staged a retrospective of his life and work titled: “Achille Castiglioni: Design!” curated by Paola Antonelli; in 2014 the city of Milan named a street after the three Castiglioni brothers.
Museums holding Castiglioni’s works include, amongst others, MoMA in New York, Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Kunstgewerbe Museum in Zurich, Staatliches Museum für angewandte Kunst in Munich, Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and the ADI Design Museum here in Milan.
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