Zanotta Buys Mollino Archive

Zanotta said on April 15 it has acquired Carlo Mollino’s artistic archive and the exclusive license to produce 30 of his designs. (zanotta.prezly.com) The Italian company said the rights were granted by the Italian State after a public tender, and that the archive includes original drawings and sketches by the Turin architect, designer and photographer. (zanotta.prezly.com) At Milan Design Week, running April 20 to 26, Zanotta plans to show the “Vertebra” table, a Mollino project that the company said has never before been realized for industrial production. (zanotta.prezly.com) (salonemilano.it) Wallpaper reported that the deal gives Zanotta a single license for a larger body of Mollino designs intended for industrial production, extending a relationship between the brand and Mollino’s estate that dates to 1981. (wallpaper.com) (salonemilano.it) That matters in a market where many Mollino pieces have circulated more as rare editions and collector objects than as standard catalog products. Wallpaper said Mollino generally worked with artisans and small-scale manufacturers rather than mass production during his lifetime. (wallpaper.com) Zanotta said the acquisition adds 30 projects to its historical archive, while Mollino’s broader professional archive at the Polytechnic University of Turin includes nearly 17,000 graphic plates, technical drawings and sketches, about 15,000 photographs, and more than 70 handwritten and typed documents. (zanotta.prezly.com) Mollino, who was born in Turin in 1905 and died in 1973, worked across architecture, furniture, photography and writing. Zanotta describes him as a designer of zoomorphic forms and anatomical curves; the company says the “Vertebra” table follows that language with a skeletal structure. (zanotta.com) (zanotta.prezly.com) Zanotta has been issuing Mollino re-editions since 1981, according to Salone del Mobile, which said eight Mollino pieces entered the company’s collections over the years, including the Fenis chair and later the Carlo Mollino Collection in 2020. (salonemilano.it) Wallpaper said only two examples of the “Vertebra” had previously been produced, and both were sold at auction three years ago. The new launch turns a design that largely lived in archives and the secondary market into a Zanotta product debut in Milan. (wallpaper.com)