| The designer not as a "beautician" but as a true industrial designer. |
Who is he
Marcello Nizzoli
Doorhandle prototype (1954 Olivari)
| From
the book "L'architettura presa per mano" (Hand on architecture) by Stefano Casciani,
Idea Books, Milan, 1992 Nizzoli (or in other words, Italian industrial design of the 1950's) revolutionized the formal language of the "machine" with the Lexikon 80 model, already in 1946. With the introduction of die-casted aluminium bodies it became possible to produce a typewriter with a continuous form; this made an "organic" style, in Italian design and in Nizzoli's work, feasible. Already before the war he gave abundant proof of his ability as an artist and an architect: in abstract paintings, advertising designs, interior decoration for the Milan Triennial (in collaboration with Persico), and the two Parker shops. But it was with Olivetti that he was to make a decisive contribution to the development of industrial design: in his articles for the magazine "Stile Industria" he describes the designer who must, in his collaboration with the factory, be able to discuss the possibilities of modifying the object in order to improve its form (even if asked to give form to a product that has already been, in general lines, resolved). |
 Scene for the hall dedicated to the Exhibition of the Fascist Revolution in 1919, Rome, Exhibition Palace in via Nazionale (1932) |
| The
designer, therefore, not as a "beautician" but as a true industrial designer.
Nizzoli applied this ability to design, refined in several years' collaboration
with Olivetti, to all his work. When he received the commission for the ENI office building (now SNAM) at San Donato Milanese, he therefore conceived the building as a great tower/machine. Along with the purest language of classic architecture, this structure is characterized by the modern one of new materials and technology. Glass, aluminium, bare concrete, abstract mural decorations blend with the refined use of wood panelling in the interiors. The first nucleus of a historical architectural complex, to be developed over the years until the recent construction of Gabetti and Isola's Fifth Office Building (inaugurated in December 1991), was thus created. Returning to Nizzoli's original project, we find a great number of models that preceded the definitive SNAM doorhandle, which was already at that time made by Olivari and which has remained, incessantly, in production since then. |
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