The Enlightenment 2.0: #Pedraligoodideas at Salone del Mobile 2018

The lightbulb moment. That flash of inspiration where suddenly out of an epistemological darkness clarity emerges. A solution. An innovation. A new way of thinking.

Pedrali, the Bergamo-based furniture and lighting brand that’s long been known for its commitment to technology-driven, sustainability-embracing industrial production has had its fair share of lightbulb moments (all LED, of course), its enviable catalogue of award-winning products testifying to this. This is in no small part thanks to the culture of innovation, of research and development that it has fostered over decades, both in-house and via a raft of collaborations with designers and architects, be they established names or emerging talent.

So when it came to selecting a single visual metaphor to capture the essence of Pedrali’s innovative design approach, architects Calvi Brambilla – who’ve become the go-to designers for those discerning brands looking for stands more akin to total, architecturally considered environments than mere product platforms – chose the lightbulb, that humble, utilitarian and ubiquitous object, as leitmotiv for the brand’s exhibition at the recent Salone del Mobile in Milan.

Emphatically deployed across the entire, archly architectural concept, the lights served both to define and demarcate the various spaces that made up the stand-as-stage-set, while at the same time communicating the idea of show, of performance. Think old fashioned theatrical footlights front of stage, or the bulbs around dressing-room mirrors backstage…

So it was here that the company’s brightest new products – otherwise known in these social-media times in which we live as #Pedraligoodideas – delivered a command performance. With visitors invited to circulate through seven distinct exhibition spaces, organised over 800 square metres, they were introduced to Pedrali’s 13 new, up-and-coming products, making their debut appearance at the Salone, along with new partnerships with Catalan designer Eugeni Quitllet and the Italian designer Luca Casini.

Suggestive of classic bentwood, Quitllet’s Remind armchair is constituted materially of polypropylene, with an ergonomic precision that guarantees total comfort. His Soul chair, meanwhile – in wood with a polycarbonate seat – is a clever and unexpected, yet somehow harmonious, material marriage. Casini, on the other hand, has authored an elegant and pared-down table called Fluxo, whose reduction belies its robustness.

The classic outdoor spaghetti furniture typology has been revisited by Mandelli Pagliarulo in the form of their new Tribeca seating collection, which combines the optical lightness that its plastic-tape seating provides with bold chromatic expression. Indoors, as it were, design trio Cazzaniga Mandelli Pagliarulo’s Nym chair – a contemporary reworking of the English Windsor chair archetype – sees a new upholstered version, Nym Soft, and a stool variant join the family. Their new Osaka Lounge chair, with its thoughtful union of metal legs, delicate wood armrests and generous upholstery, also took to the stage in Milan.

An upholstered version (in either leather or fabric) of respected French designer Patrick Norguet’s distinctively formed Fox armchair, Fox Soft, made a confident appearance, as well as his Vic side chair: a minimally articulated, richly upholstered piece that visually communicates the comfort it promises its user.

Fellow Frenchman Patrick Jouin’s Elliot table, which, with its elegant, raised feet, touches the ground lightly, was also on show, while Busetti Garuti Redaelli’s Buddy collection of poufs, with their friendly, rounded forms – launched at last year’s Salone – were complemented this time round by generous backrest versions.

Last but not least, Milan-based Odo Fioravanti was the designer behind two further products to premiere at the fair: the stackable, super-rational Dome plastic barstool, whose form recalls the craftsmanship of wood joinery, and the new Babila stool with backrest, with clean-lined styling that doesn’t come at the expense of feel-good ergonomics.

Having clocked up 30 years of Salone presentations, Pedrali, occupying that sweet spot of industrial know-how and design expertise, still knows how to steal the limelight.

© Architonic