Upward curve: Minotti

For a company with a strong heritage, it can sometimes be a challenge to keep moving forward. Over the past few years, many of the design world’s most respected 20th-century brands have played it safe by reviving old classics. But not Minotti. The storied Italian design brand shows no signs of falling into the nostalgia trap. Last year, under the guidance of Art Director Rodolfo Dordoni, the Italian brand celebrated its 70th anniversary by collaborating with new designers for the first time after 20 years.

For 2019 it has unveiled Indoor and Outdoor collections – coordinated by Rodolfo Dordoni with Minotti Studio – that push the boundaries of the Minotti aesthetic, as well as its first collaboration with the Italian-Danish design stars GamFratesi.

“Our intention is to provide food for thought in a surprising, creative, practical and dynamic way, to all those who choose our brand around the world,” explained joint CEOs Renato and Roberto Minotti. “The new collection marks an important evolutionary step in the history of our brand with a new decorative code that mixes different styles,” they added. “It brings a new vision of the living area to life, in which seating systems and furniture outline structured spaces and reveal new geometries in a continuous alternation of curves and straight lines.”

The collections are designed to complement each other, enabling a seamless blend between outdoors and indoors for residential and hospitality contexts. At their heart is an exploration of form, bringing together divergent approaches to design from around the world.

There are new pieces by feted Japanese studio Nendo, Brazilian architect Marcio Kogan of Studio mk27, French designer Christophe Delcourt and GamFratesi, alongside products developed by Rodolfo Dordoni and the Minotti Studio team.

The Angie and Shelley armchairs are the first output from the new partnership between Minotti and Copenhagen-based designers Stine Gam and Enrico Fratesi. Angie is characterised by a curved, leather-clad back and arm structure that also encases the upholstered, low seat, combining fluidity and rigidity. The compact, cube-like form of the Shelley design – available as a classic armchair or lounger – features a saddle-leather exterior, swaddling the seat and wrapping around the legs to bind them to the structure. The designers described their approach as an exercise in contrasts.

Available in round, rectangular or barrel-shaped versions with Moka-coloured ash wood, marble or glass table tops, the Wedge table range by Nendo’s founder Oki Sato also plays with contrast. The table tops sit on chunky, semi-circular legs with giant slices carved out of them, combining sharp and soft, lightness and heaviness.

Seating has been at the core of the Minotti identity for decades, so it is perhaps unsurprising that there are three new seating systems within the 2019 collection too.

The Daniels is a curvy, modular arrangement by Christophe Delcourt that is a natural evolution of the designer’s formal investigations in shape. Innovative and truly original – and most striking when paired with the Amber low units – Daniels makes a strong visual impact and with its seats of different depths, in which regular curves and ellipses interrupt the linearity of the layouts, its imbued with a more dynamic momentum.

Rodolfo Dordoni’s West system bridges the gap between Minotti’s past – which tended to focus on regularity and rectangular shapes – and its new, more explorative approach. Generously proportioned rectilinear sofas are backed with saddle-hide leather panels, while coffee tables and other modular elements can be integrated seamlessly into the system. “West is the symbol of the company’s stylistic continuity and of the proven synergy between the various figures who take part in the creative process,” said Dordoni. Finally, Dordoni's Lawson seating system features gently moulded sofa structures with winged, saddle-hide leather back and arm supports.

For the Outdoor collection, Minotti has further developed Marcio Kogan’s Quadrado furniture range, with new seats and a table as well as a huge double daybed. It has also reinterpreted Nendo’s Tape furniture family with new materials to create the Tape Cord Outdoor range, with small tables and seats that are particularly suited to compact urban gardens and patios.

“The distinctive formal and aesthetic details, finishes and textures are the common thread that sees such a smooth harmony descend upon the collection, underlining the meeting and interaction between the different styles of the two designers,” explained Renato Minotti.

“By seamlessly becoming part of the ‘Minotti project’, these designers with strong identities rooted in different cultures have joined us in creating a renewed stylistic code with an international flavour,” added Roberto Minotti.

© Architonic