Carlo Colombo

Background

Carlo Colombo was born in Carimate in 1967, according to Interni magazine, and received his architecture degree from Milan's Politecnico in 1993. Flexform says he went on to develop design projects with leading furniture manufacturers, and Artemide adds that he worked above all on the design and marketing of industrial products, graphics and set-ups for the best brands of Italian design.

Signature Style

Interni, writing on the first monograph on him published by Electa, says that in his design projects he proceeds through progressive reduction, eliminating the superfluous and favouring natural materials, combined with artificial substances to bring out their aesthetic and tactile qualities. His interiors and architecture stand out, it says, for pure lines and formal abstraction, firmly tied to the production of materials.

Notable Works

The same article lists the Blueberry chair for BYografia (2010), the Air table for Poliform (2009), collections for Antoniolupi, the Ball chair for Arflex (2008) and sneakers for Levi's, and names collaborations from Fratelli Guzzini to Artemide, Zanotta, Franke and Poliform. For Flexform his products are Sveva, Newbridge, Alison, Isabel, Jeremy and Gustav, alongside the Edmond sofa of 2013.

Legacy

Flexform says he was named designer of the year in 2004. In 2013 he founded the A++ architecture studio with Paolo Colombo in Lugano, with studios in Zurich, New York, Miami and Dubai, and Artemide records exhibitions of his projects in Paris, Bremen, Cologne, Milan (Triennale, 2016) and Catanzaro (2017).