Molteni & C

Molteni Group

The Molteni group is one of Italy's leading industrial groups in the furnishing sector. It comprises three companies, each one a leader in its own sector: Molteni & C Spa (home furnishings), Unifor Spa (office furnishings) and Dada Spa (kitchens). It provides a global offer in the furniture sector to 37 countries around the world, as well as in Italy.

The group has a long history. Its business activities started in the 1930s with a craft firm, Molteni, which started to expand in the 1950s, opting for mechanisation with a view to industrial production. In the 1970s, it split into three companies as a result of its size and to better respond to the needs of the market. Today, the Molteni Group is one of the few with an integral manufacturing cycle: it has total control of its production, from the choice of materials to the final definition of the piece. The three companies have developed an extensive synergy in terms of technology, research and the exploration of new types adapted to the changes in course in the home and workplace.

The Molteni group has always worked with first-rate designers such as Pier Luigi Cerri, Michele De Lucchi, Rodolfo Dordoni, Foster & Partners, Ferruccio Laviani, Luca Meda, Jean Nouvel, Pagani e Perversi, Bruno Reichlin, Aldo Rossi, Afra and Tobia Scarpa, Gerard Van den Berg, Hannes Wettstein, Patricia Urquiola and Paola Navone.

Molteni&C
Molteni & C is a company with advanced technology and a longstanding tradition. In the 1970s, it started to define its identity by following two routes. First, it implemented ongoing research in the sector of modular furniture, developing with Luca Meda's designs a number of solutions suited to all parts of the home, from wardrobe to living room and study/home office. Modular systems such as 505, 7volte7 and Pass, to name but a few, are designs in constant evolution, both in technical and construction terms, as well as in function and comfort. They have been highly successful and Molteni is considered a leader in this sector.

Since the 1980s, in particular, Molteni has proposed a large collection of single pieces that can with the modular furnishings create a home of simple elegance. From the types bound to the collective living memory, characteristic of the designs of Aldo Rossi, it came, in the 1990s, to produce furnishings such as those designed by Jean Nouvel, in which essence blends with advanced technological solutions, a research terrain that has always distinguished the company.

The company made a dual choice. On the one hand, to maintain sophisticated craftsmanship in-house, as regards material know-how, careful finishes and product customisation. On the other, the company has always developed its research on the terrain of technological research, with the ongoing experimentation of innovatory solutions. Molteni furniture incorporates the expertise of a long craft tradition plus innovatory technological quality, which facilitates the life of the user but is in no way ostentatious. When talking about Molteni, people also speak of hidden quality, alluding to the technical, functional and material quality present but often unseen in its furniture. Molteni quality is well known in Italy where the group is based, but also internationally, because the company exports to the leading world markets.

All the designers that work with Molteni are highly individual but agree on the fact that furniture must be elegant and comfortable, but also sturdy and incorporate attention to detail and be produced from fine woods and carefully checked materials. This is furniture that, apart from the individual charm of each piece, offers a possibility to define - with a wealth of choices but a single good taste - the lifestyle in the Molteni home .

Today, both individual pieces and modular systems are conceived for the simple elegant home that is also unconstrained and capable of responding to the new needs produced both by the current changes in lifestyles and computerisation with home entertainment and home offices. Molteni proposes modular systems that are highly functional and attractive but are also conceived for practical and free solutions, suitable to store and offer easy use of information-telecom technology. Globalisation and the computer revolution drive such a Group to conduct constant research into new technological and type solutions, to facilitate both domestic comfort and work activities.

Molteni is also active in major contracts such as hotels, museums, ships, shop chains, hospitals and theatres. Recent examples include furnishings for the Walt Disney cruise ships built by Fincantieri, furnishings for the Cartier chain of boutiques all over the world and for the Cartier Foundation in Paris, the interiors for the La Fenice theatre in Venice and the furnishings for public areas on the cruise ships of the Holland America Line and P&O North Sea Ferries.