Abele Desk Lamps Gianfranco Frattini for Luci - Austin Calhoon Photograph

Gianfranco Frattini (May 15, 1926 – April 6, 2004) was an Italian architect and designer. He is a member of the generation that created the Italian design movement in the late 1950s through the 1960s and is considered to have played a major role in shaping it.

Early life and education

Gianfranco Frattini was born in

Padua Padua ( ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Veneto, northern Italy, and the capital of the province of Padua. The city lies on the banks of the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice and southeast of Vicenza, and has a population of 20 ...

, Italy on May 15, 1926. He graduated with a degree in

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

from the

Politecnico di Milano The Polytechnic University of Milan (, abbreviated as PoliMi) is a university in Milan, Italy. It is the largest technical university in the country, with about 40,000 enrolled students. The university offers undergraduate, graduate, and higher ...

in 1953.

Work and career

Frattini opened his own professional practice in

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

, after having worked in the office of his teacher and mentor

Giò Ponti Giovanni "Gio" Ponti (; 18 November 1891 – 16 September 1979) was an Italian architect, industrial designer, furniture designer, artist, teacher, writer and publisher. During his career, which spanned six decades, Ponti built more than a hu ...

. Frattini became an industrial designer by default when he lacked appropriate lighting and furniture for his interiors. His collaboration with Cesare Cassina for his namesake company started in 1954, followed by collaborations with many other manufacturers, such as Bernini, Arteluce, Acerbis, Fantoni, Artemide (for whom among others pieces with

Livio Castiglioni Livio Castiglioni (16 January 1911 – 30 April 1979) was an Italian architect and designer. He made a significant contribution to twentieth-century Italian lighting design and was an early proponent of the practice of industrial design in Ital ...

he designed the historic Boalum lamp), Luci,

Knoll In geography, knoll is another term for a knowe or hillock, a small, low, round natural hill or mound. Knoll may also refer to: Places * Knoll Camp, site of an Iron Age hill fort Hampshire, England, United Kingdom * Knoll Lake, Leonard Canyon, ...

, Lema and many others. In 1956 he co-founded

Associazione per il Disegno Industriale Associazione per il Disegno Industriale (ADI), is an Italian professional organisation of about 1,100 architects, designers, manufacturers, trade journalists, academics, and design universities. Its primary purpose is the promotion of good des ...

and throughout his career he practiced both industrial design and architecture, focusing mostly on interiors. His residential commissions included numerous private apartments and palazzos, stores, and offices. His international commissions took him to Dusseldorf and Luxembourg, where he designed the interiors of the luxury stores, and Tokyo, where he designed the interior public spaces of the Tokyo Hilton. Frattini was a board member of the

Triennale The Triennale di Milano is a museum of art and design in the Parco Sempione in Milan, in Lombardy in northern Italy. It is housed in the , built between 1931 and 1933 to designs by Giovanni Muzio and financed by Antonio Bernocchi and his ...

. A great connoisseur of wood craftsmanship, he forged a long and fruitful professional partnership with the master craftsman from Bovisio Masciago (Milan), Pierluigi Ghianda. Glassware designed by Gianfranco Frattini for Progetti is in the permanent collection of the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

and the Boalum lamp (with Livio Castiglioni) produced by Artemide is in the collection of the Smithsonian,

Cooper-Hewitt Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum at the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile. It is one of 19 Smithsonian Institution museums and one of three Smithsonian facili ...

National Design Museum.

Gallery of works

Anacapri Anacapri () is a ''comune'' on the island of Capri, in the Metropolitan City of Naples, Italy. Anacapri is located higher on the island than Capri (about higher on average)—the Ancient Greek prefix ''ana-'' meaning "up" or "above". Admini ...

Early life and education

Work and career

Gallery of works

Death and afterward

Awards and honors

References

External links