Catellani & Smith:

Carlo Catellani was born in Parma in 1960. After leaving school, he started a career as a smith in a workshop in Fornovo. Logan Smith, born in London in 1931, graduated in architecture from Cambridge and soon, due to his love to the world of horses, specialised in the renovation of race tracks and horse clubs. Then the two met in Minorca in the summer of 1985 to a big horse race. The extraordinary euphoria of those evenings gave rise to the idea of designing and producing decorative lamps and everyday objects. This was the founding of Catellani & Smith, where products are crafted with the hands and the mind. More information about the products: Most importantly, it has two new elements: for the first time, with Post Krisi, I have added colour or rather I have brought it to the forefront. Lamps, hand-painted with pure primary colours; lamps with two sides where light interacts simultaneously with colour and shape creating an interplay of transparency and contrasts. The shape, an element that has always had an all-important role in Catellani & Smith's collections, once again imprisons the light, moulding the shadows, but this time the effect is more pronounced: the bowl, in fact, is a deliberate mingling of the elasticity and robust transparency of the glass cloth, which, by simple movements, allows variations in shape, producing intriguing and suggestive shadows on the wall, the effect of which is enhanced by the fringing; much like a piece of ripped cloth. Extremely resistant lamps, but with a precarious look, they project us into a fantastic world, with an atmosphere vaguely similar to that created by Japanese paper lamps. Coloured lights that draw shadows, lights with pure shapes and primary colours, glass paper, elastic glass, waterproof paper, ripped shreds with physical characteristics that contrast harmoniously with the pure, cold steel structure: almost as if by the hand of a child. I have used glass cloth to create transparency, leaving it pure and unpainted: the effect is just as captivating; the weave of the cloth incorporated in the resin breaks up the light almost creating a reflection. Lamps to toy with, shapes to invent, patches of colour that transform into patterns of light. This collection, with its infinite combinations, has only one limitation: it is difficult to say no! Enzo Catellani