> 2 PIANO, GLASS AND LIGHT. After the Morgan Library Renzo Piano has done it again: he has chosen the

Silver chairs for Il Sole 24 Ore. > 4 A FATEFUL MEETING. In the Bodum guesthouse in Denmark, Danish style

is Made in Italy. > 6 MANTIS, THE GENTLE TABLE. Patricia Urquiola believes in emotion: she narrates objects

with adjectives usually used to describe people. > 8 THE POSTER. è De Padova 2009. Men and furniture dance,

the future order will be impossible to grasp. > 10 ESSENTIAL THEATER. The new offices of Teatro Franco Par-

enti in Milan are the stage for furnishings designed by Vico Magistretti. > 13 DINNER IS SERVED. The Italo-

French taste of the MeMo cooking school attracts good architects and good design. > 14 VOYAGE IN THE TEM-

PLE OF WORDS. De Padova style meets the monumental, solemn rigor of the headquarters of Corriere della

Sera in Milan. > 15 PAUL KLEE ZENTRUM. The magical worlds of Paul Klee materialize on the hills. FRAL AR-

CHITETTURE. An architecture studio in the spaces of a building from the early 1900s. > 16 NO USE TRYING TO

ESCAPE. A short story by Marco Ciriello.

NUMBER 0 | JANUARY 2009 | È DepaDova | STRADA PADANA SUPERIORE 280, 20090 VIMODRONE (MI) ITALY | Ph: +39 02 27439795 | FAX: +39 02 27439780 | INFO@DEPADOVA.IT | WWW.DEPADOVA.IT

| 2 | S E T T I N G S

Where there’s DESIGN, there’s De Padova. In the midst of our doings we are caught by folly or stupidity,

we can’t always live on planes that fit together, the project tries to connect them, true design is dialogue among parts,

dialectic, correct measure, denominator, satisfaction of needs, overcoming awkwardness, the void and the problem.

The charm of an idea that takes form.

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Gian

ni B

eren

go G

ardi

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S E T T I N G S | 3 |

Silver

Renzo Piano has done it again. Selecting the Silver chairs by Vico Magistretti. This time for the refreshment zone of the new il Sole

24 Ore facility. As in the Café Mezzanine of Centre

George Pompidou, or the cafes of the Morgan Library in New York and the Paul Klee Zentrum in Berne. Before they were black; now they are orange, with an eye on the il Sole 24 Ore logo.

Piano and Magistretti, two men who might seem to be separated in every way: by age, career, roots. Yet it is still easy to glimpse something solid that unites them, in their idea of the world and of architecture.

Piano says: «Personally, I think my desire to explore

uncharted paths goes together perfectly with my acknowl-

edgment of the tradition. Maybe this is a European trait,

or maybe it is specifically Italian. There is certainly the

inheritance of a humanistic culture».

Magistretti said: «My first trip to New York in ‘54

gave me a lot, it gave me head start in coming to terms

with a worldview I had only read about. Travel opens

your mind, like studying Latin, it helps you to learn

that there are very important things, things others are

able to do much better, other things that could still be

improved: in short, traveling gives you an experience like

going to classical high school».

Another shared area of interest, for the two men, is the culture of information and words.

Piano has become the international architect of reference for projects involving information and culture. Besides the il Sole 24 Ore headquarters, he has also designed the new building for the New

York Times. Another major project is the one for the former Falck area at Sesto San Giovanni: a fac-tory-city transformed into a factory of ideas. Open, transparent, light works of architecture, works that “listen”, as Piano puts it, ready for interaction.

And Vico Magistretti? Someone once wrote that he transformed words into design. When he was asked about his work with De Padova he would respond:«Here one works by talking, meeting with peo-

ple, discussing. Design also means talking together. My

work is made of words. It is a dialogue among different

kinds of expertise. I chat with those who produce, with

workers and upholsterers who know all the technical se-

crets. The secret of Italian Design is all here, in this close

collaboration between production and design».

They are both sons of the Bauhaus, different but similar. Vico was for less instead of too much, for subtraction as opposed to accumulation, for mass

production rather than one-offs. Piano, on the sub-ject of the Beaubourg in Paris, has said: «I began to

design it forty years ago with Richard Rogers: we wanted

to erase the idea of a museum as a static, substantially

dead place. We thought of a place for everyone, where

people would discuss works, to encourage debate».

And the Silver chairs?What do the aluminium and plastic chairs de-

signed by Vico Magistretti for De Padova in 1989 have to do with these currents of thoughts and words?

The explanation comes from Magistretti him-self. He tells us how the chairs came to life, pre-cisely from thoughts and words: «These are chairs

with different variations: with armrests, without arm-

rests. They are made with contemporary materials and

technologies. It is a tribute to Thonet, who made a chair

with a similar form. I think it is correct to reutilize it,

because I have always liked Thonets. But it is no longer

in wood, it is made of metal and plastic, there is no more

straw. At the same time it is a tribute to other objects

you see in the real world: a memory of the baskets used in

Japanese markets, in Tokyo, to hold eggs; they have these

square holes, which I have always liked a lot, so I have

used them for the seat and back of this chair».

piano, glass and lightWhen you work in the historical centre of a city, you should not worry about the lack of freedom, but be grateful for the restrictions that are imposed. Creativity does not need freedom, it needs rules: then it can occasionally be fun to break them.

Renzo Piano

| p h o t o P a o l o R i o l z i |

T h e R e f R e s h m e n T z o n e o f T h e n e w i l s o l e 2 4 o R e h e a d q u a R T e R s

IL SoLe 24 oRe Milano, via Monte Rosa 91

DInIng haLL anD cafeYear of construction: 2004architecture and interior design:Renzo Piano Building Workshop

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| 4 | S E T T I N G S

a fateful meetingT h e B o d u m g u e s T h o u s e i n d e n m a R k

| p h o t o P a o l o R i o l z i |

destiny always starts from a distance. From knowing how to interpret the signs. The story of Bodum, thirty km from Copen-

hagen, facing the Baltic, is an example of how an encounter can be a combination of fate, intelligence and energy, and the will to find meaning and con-nections in things.

It all began in the summer of 1955, at piazza Duomo in Milan, when Maddalena De Padova and her husband Fernando changed their vacation plans in response to an elusive but strong intuition. They decided to visit Copenhagen.

Something urged them to know the great spaces of northern Europe, Scandinavian design, houses furnished with light, pale objects.

In Copenhagen, during the same period, Mr. Pe-ter Bodum, a wholesaler of household goods, had a dream: he wanted to create his own line of prod-

ucts. He approached young designers and graphic artists, got them involved, asked them to create things for him.

In 1958 he launched the Santos coffeemaker on the market. It was a success, not only in Denmark, but all over Europe as well: design and technology. Perfect, and for everyone. Then came coffeepots, teapots, salad bowls, glasses, sugar dispensers. Sim-ple, light, transparent objects, in keeping with the tradition of Scandinavian design.

That style of furniture design that De Padova, in 1958, had begun to import and market in Italy, creating a little big revolution in Italian homes.

In the meantime the Bodum company grew. Since the 1970s Jörgen, Peter’s son, has guided Bodum, together with his sister. They called on Carsten Jör-gensen, a teacher at the Danish School of Art in Co-penhagen, to create the image and design of Bodum

products. It was the triumph of the philosophy of industrial design dreamed of by Peter Bodum, and it meant success and growth for the company all over the world, with 52 flagship stores.

Jörgen Bodum opened offices and shops around the world, but also guesthouses, elegant spaces of hospitality where he can welcome collaborators and organize business meetings.

The latest guesthouse is in Hornbæk, a few kilo-meters from one of the world’s most beautiful mod-ern art museums, the Louisiana. Once again, it was time to furnish a new place. Rooms open to the sea, full of light and simple, linear geometries.

Mr. Bodum had a precise idea in mind. He want-ed De Padova to add life to those spaces. It was the inevitable fate of a meeting. The curiosity of a trip taken many years ago has led, today, to the house illustrated in these photographs.

Where there’s HISTORY, there’s De Padova. You can enter brandishing weapons or on tiptoe, through a window

or the page of a notebook, by bicycle or in an old car, you never know when you are inside and truly there,

you only discover it later, when the thing is done, and stated by others, the faces of strangers, the words of a faraway

woman, or just a phrase on a wall, the same wall as when you were a child.

BoDUM hornbæk, Denmark

gUeSthoUSeYear of construction: 2007architecture and interior design:Ronnie Yue with Jörgen Bodumproject area: 300 sq meters

S E T T I N G S | 5 |

a fateful meeting

Raffles Incisa Vidun Basket Sleeping car Shine

«It’s an object that flies on four legs, a grand gesture

that is still gentle… it makes you want to thank it…»

Patricia Urquiola insists on emotion. It’s part of her character and you can see it in her work. To narrate objects she uses the same adjectives we would usu-ally apply to people. Mantis, for example, the programme of tables she has designed for De Padova, is gentle.Gentle is a recurring term in our conversation: «the new table has sheet-metal legs, a gentle industrial material that has been gently bent. A sturdy cen-tral beam in aluminium forms the spine. The top is more slender, with smoothed corners, something like the wing of an airplane».

Patricia, how did the idea of designing a meeting table

come up?

«We met with De Padova precisely with the idea of thinking about this type of product. My rela-tionship with the company is made of memories, recollections and emotions. So during the briefing we recalled that I had helped Vico Magistretti to create Shine, a programme of oval and rectangular tables of different sizes. The challenge was to go one step further».

Shine is based on lightness, it’s a table halfway between

use in the home and use in the office. What is the key to

Mantis?

«The structure. I proposed a very large table that could support a top up to 7 meters long, because

that is the limit for tables with only four resting points. I hate to miniaturize tables, at home I have an immense one, at the entrance.Maddalena De Padova once told me: “if you have a

small space, put a big table in it”. It’s nice to have a surface on which to put anything, it’s a horizontal bookcase, a point of reference.Mantis was born like that, big, and it was only lat-er, in a second phase, that we resized it. We took it to more natural proportions, so it can truly be used in any space. It will evolve, in the future, also in a version with three resting points. The legs are at-tached to the central beam and joined together to create an interesting effect».

Can you tell us about the passages in the creation of

the project?

«It was a playful, light job. As we were doing it one of the company engineers said: “let’s jump on

the table to see if it stands up”. Design always implies technological research, and Mantis too is a story of many small victories. The technology is innova-tive, but on first glance the object doesn’t reveal all the research behind it. That’s another thing I have learned from De Padova: for them, technological research is always combined with the theme of memory. There is the taste for craftsmanship, and there is innovation».

Is that, perhaps, the secret of true modernity?

«Yes. That is how a product becomes timeless, and when it is timeless it can become a great clas-

sic, even if it’s new. Yesterday I walked by the shop windows on corso Venezia, and I saw my Bergère. It looked as if it had always been there. I hope the same thing happens with Mantis. I think it is a true De Padova: this company has given me an imprint, I like the fact that my objects fit in perfectly with De Padova».

You are very prolific, but you rarely work on projects for

the office. Does Mantis mean that you are moving toward

the world of contract?

«I tried to avoid making a piece of office furniture. I’m interested in the contrast between different languages, and I think the world of the office needs to become more gentle, softer, to mix the elements. The sort of four-legged magic that is Mantis was created for a meeting room, but I can also imag-ine it in a country house, where old architecture is combined with industrial overtones».

Whom do you have in mind when you design? You’ve

always said that you are your own primary client.

«Not the primary client, the only client I know. I know what I like. Here again, Maddalena De Pa-dova has taught me: she has always kept her fur-niture in her own home, precisely to test it. She is concerned about what she offers to others. For me, the fact that she surrounds herself with the objects she produces is a form of honesty».

Does this mean you’ll be using Mantis in your studio?

«Of course. A big table has the function of creat-ing a sense of community».

mantis, the gentle tablePaT R i c i a u R q u i o l a Ta l k s a B o u T h e R l aT e s T P R o j e c T f o R d e Pa d o va

| p h o t o L u c i a n o S o a v e |

Where there’s PASSION, there’s De Padova. There’s the one of prophets, of women or just of those who dream

of a better world, it is a fever that sickens and grants joy, not utopia but truth you can glimpse, full of bluster at times,

it makes you feel safe where you’re not, makes you rise from certain beds no one would flee, imagine better times,

it is present and future together, like a knot, that has a form you think you know but cannot name.

patRIcIa URqUIoLa was born in Oviedo, Spain. She studied at the Facultad de Arquitectura de Madrid and took a degree at the Politecnico di Milano in 1989, under the guidance of Achille Castiglioni. In 1991 she began to work at De Padova in the research and development division. It was here that she met Vico Magistretti.Other fundamental steps in her career came in 1994, with the collaboration with Piero Lissoni, and in 1998, with Patrizia Moroso. She opened her design studio in Milan in 2001.

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| 6 | N E W S

My real relationship with design began with De Padova,

when I was the assistant of Maddalena De Padova. It was my

first job. Maddalena is a woman of great personality, very in-

telligent, very quick in her thinking and actions. On the other

hand, it is part of my nature to break down barriers in rela-

tionships. She gave me room, I could express myself freely.

I was a bit reckless in these things. Maddalena understood

my character very well, and she knew how to use me, in the

best sense of the term, because when you’re working there

has to be give and take. There were tensions, concerns, but

also fun. Maddalena helped me to understand that work, if

it accompanies you throughout your life like a friend instead

of an obligation, can be marvelous. This was her teaching,

and also that of Magistretti and Castiglioni.

Another thing I think is brilliant about our relationship: she

made editions, but from the start I saw her as an entrepre-

neur, a producer, an erudite counterpart in short.

Someone with whom to establish a dialogue, to discuss

projects and create them. And, in fact, today my work is not

in the office. It is in relation to companies, it is there that

the fun begins.

“

”

N E W S | 7 |

patRIcIa uRquIolaMy fiRSt tiMe

POSTER Men and objects dance, the future order will be far from possible to grasp. Lukewarm monsters amidst

clear objects, men with minds of their own mingled with settled forms, a landscape of sharp contrasts. The only tools

of struggle against the spinelessness of the banal, that dominates, methodical, incessantly grinding. Despotic deception

that invades, controls you. To escape the vortex your last resort is to set your sights on an impeccable object.

| 8 | P O S T E R

P O S T E R | 9 |

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| 1 0 | S E T T I N G S

an essential theater35 yeaRs ago, in milan: The founding of salone PieRlomBaRdo, now TeaTRo fRanco PaRenTi

| p h o t o L u c i a n o S o a v e |

teatRo fRanco paRentIMilano, via Vasari 15

offIceS, cafe, foYeRYear of construction: 2007architectural design: Michele De LucchiInterior design: Teatro Franco Parentiproject area: 530 sq meters

The project is always a project of life, because objects speak even when we are not using them. So behind every project there is a destiny, a telos that goes beyond the practical function of the object itself.

Michele De Lucchi

Where there’s CULTURE, there’s De Padova. It has had servants and captains, inhabited future cities and forgotten places,

managed to remain itself in the midst of perpetual change. Its shortcoming has been not to recognize wrongs,

involuntary ones. Often it has become a reason for living, even the sole certainty in chaos, for some: a religion, for others

an enemy hard to understand. Capable of laying truth bare and analyzing order, it often disappears, just like the clouds.

On these pages, photographs of the entrance and the foyer of Teatro Franco Parenti. In the dressing rooms and offices, De Padova furnishings establish a dialogue with traditional pieces and items found at flea markets.

less is more. That’s easy to say, today, but just think about the situation in 1973.In those days culture in Milan meant Teatro

alla Scala, the Piccolo Teatro, the Triennale, the Società

Umanitaria and the Circolo Turati. Five cumbersome giants, seldom interested in coming to grips with the rest of the world and new developments.

But something was about to happen, back in 1973.

The birth of a different theater. Far from the rhet-oric, the bombast, the chandeliers of the cartoons of Giuseppe Novello. And far from the historical cen-ter of the city, on via Pier Lombardo, beyond Porta Romana. It was born and desired by a theater group, those “without a parish, vagabonds of spirit and culture”, as Giovanni Testori, one of the founders together with Franco Parenti, Dante Isella, Andrée Ruth Shammah and Gian Maurizio Fercioni, put it. Less

is more. Less privileges, less audience, less money. An essential theater. Intense, refined, humble.

Salone Pier Lombardo, named for the street where it stands, raised its curtain on 16 January 1973, with Testori’s Ambleto. It would later become Teatro Fran-

co Parenti. But there is still a long story to tell.A writer (Testori), an actor (Parenti), a linguist

(Isella), a director (Shammah) and a set designer (Fercioni). Each one with his own dream, but to-gether they decided on programming, tried out pieces, painted sets. They wanted a theater for ev-eryone, for Milan. They were daring. Authors un-known in Italy, reinterpretations of classics, Molière and Shaw, but also La Betia by Ruzante and read-ings from Porta. The Macbetto and the Adalgisa by Testori.

People discovered that there was room in the city for an erudite but not arrogant Milanese character, political but not ideological, open to the new but not frivolous. Theater became possibility, passion, life. The physical and metaphysical place of perfor-mances, readings, concerts, films, encounters. «The

Pier Lombardo», says former Milan mayor Carlo Tog-noli, «immediately represented a new idea of theater». Theater for the city and of the city.

The writer Giuseppe Pontiggia remarked: «The

Pier Lombardo was a space of freedom, experimentation,

renewal, in years when the Piccolo held understandable

but also dangerous sway over Milanese theatrical life, also

from a creative standpoint».1983. On the programme: Processo alla cultura

(Trial to culture). The audience is so big that the

event is moved from via Pier Lombardo to the Teatro

Lirico for five encounters, coordinated by the philoso-pher Emanuele Severino. The discussion was on reli-gion, science and philosophy. Themes that were not easy, not popular. Milan responded, to this stimulus and to others. Like the six-day event M.A.F.I.A., also in 1983: talks, films, poetry, documents on the phe-nomenon of organized crime. People went to Salone

Pier Lombardo to talk about and listen to everything. Philippe Daverio confirms: «it is the theater of the com-

munity, where people meet and live». 16 January 1998. Celebration of the 25th an-

niversary. This day marked a turning point. Milan took part, in large numbers, demonstrating its af-fection for the theater and for Andrée Shammah, who had been left alone at the helm after the death of Parenti and Testori. The theater emerged from via Pier Lombardo and invaded the city, bringing Ondine to Villa Reale, programming shows at the cloisters of the Società Umanitaria and at the Castello

Sforzesco. Things were revised. With the desire to go further. The theater became a Foundation and began to design a space for culture.

«Freedom is not what we have, but everything we still

have to take» (an aphorism from the column Il dito

S E T T I N G S | 1 1 |

assuan tools

an essential theater35 yeaRs ago, in milan: The founding of salone PieRlomBaRdo, now TeaTRo fRanco PaRenTi

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| 1 2 | S E T T I N G S

when you enter Teatro Franco Parenti, in the renovated part of the offices, you find the chairs and sofas designed by Vico Magis-

tretti for De Padova. We asked Andrée Ruth Shammah to talk about her encounter with the world of De Padova.«Maddalena De Padova and I are women who think of work as a passion in which to put everything. Maddalena has pursued taste, beauty, certain forms. This is very close to my way of making theater: the pursuit of a form. De Padova has always been ready to evolve, to renew things, through essential elegance. Just think about Magistretti, the man who made the most “table-like” table, the most “chair-like” chair. My theater, too, is very essential, because it has no sets, no ornaments. I too have always sought the essential. I’ve been walk-ing by the De Padova store every day for thirty years now. It is the only shop window that always cheers me up. When it was time to renovate the Theater, to remake the offices, I immediately thought of ask-ing De Padova. In the architectural structure of our Theater the part facing the street is for the offices.

The more internal, nocturnal part is for the dressing rooms, which are very elaborate, romantic, almost Art

Nouveau. For me, there was no doubt that the place for concentration, the place of rationality, that leaves space for fantasy, should be furnished by De Padova».

Is Milanese character something else you have in com-

mon?

«It would be great if Milan were a place built on syn-ergies between people, but unfortunately that’s not the case. This should be the main quality of Milan. The Milanese character. Instead everything is a bit random. Very few have the aesthetic continuity of De Padova, just as very few have the continuity I believe I have had.I admired Magistretti very much. In his life and his projects you can see that character of Milan I was talking about, the values, the things that should not be lost. At De Padova there is an identity. And then it is no longer just a company, it becomes a center, a place, a thought, a system of values. This also holds true for a theater. Milan should be the sum of these values. Defining them and recognizing them in our own story and the story of those around us who share these values helps a city to have a memory. It is im-portant to understand why a person can last. If there is a sense of duration in what you do, in the end you achieve a classic character, even in the things you in-vent. It means that what worked then will also work now and will work tomorrow as well. Instead of turn-ing around and saying: “Not again… I am so sick of this thing”. This is the big difficulty in fashion and design. De Padova has achieved this classic charac-ter thanks to duration, over the years, and because of work with the greatest international designers».

anDRée RUth ShaMMahTheater director and the main force behind Teatro Franco Parenti, Andrée Ruth Shammah is an outstanding figure on the Italian cultural scene. Born in Milan in 1948, of Syrian origin with a cosmopolitan background, she studied in Paris and at the Piccolo Teatro, with Giorgio Strehler and Paolo Grassi. With the seventy productions she has directed – including the memorable trilogy of Ambleto, Macbetto e Edipus and I promessi sposi alla prova – she has managed to introduce decidedly innovative elements in the contemporary theater and Italian culture, opening up perspectives in advance of new orientations, expressions and interpretations, often in contrast with established practices.

i n T e R v i e w w i T h a n d R é e R u T h s h a m m a h

the sense of duration and my milan

Where there’s TASTE, there’s De Padova. The spirit of disintegration pervades everything, disarming us, when

we believe we obey God we are following the orders of other men. It’s hard to disentangle faith, morals and authority.

Taste avoids the slavery of confusion. The material consolation of the useless teaches harmony, accustoms the gaze

to seek the efficient and the beautiful. It takes strange forms, often you find it where you would least expect it.

nell’occhio, written by Franco Parenti for L’Avanti, 1958).

The space was no longer sufficient, so in 2007 the renovation of the theater began.

The expansion project, by Michele De Lucchi under the art direction of Andrée Ruth Shammah, with the collaboration of Gian Maurizio Fercioni for the sets, is developed in four volumes, organized around the Sala Grande. Visible staircases and walk-ways lead to the theater spaces. An architectural promenade that crosses the foyer and connects the various levels, also in visual terms.

But renovating the original home on via Pier Lombardo also meant “refounding” Teatro Franco

Parenti. Identity, architectural space and artistic paths are part of a single project that includes the great classics – Aeschylus, Euripides and Shake-speare – reworked in a modern key, alongside the magic-epic-fantastic current, and the contemporary character of the Racconto Italiano.

Starting in 2007, as in an open worksite, certain protagonists of today’s culture have brought the new headquarters of Teatro Franco Parenti to life. Amos Oz, Guido Ceronetti and Carlo Cecchi laid invisible stones as steps toward the rebirth of the theater.

«One of the great merits of the Pier Lombardo», says Rosellina Archinto, «is that it helped the people of Mi-

lan to enter a theater».

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S E T T I N G S | 1 3 |

dinner is served

T h e m e m o s Pa c e , a s c h o o l o f i Ta l o - f R e n c h c u i s i n e

| p h o t o R o b e r t o to m a s i |

The great dandy of English literature Oscar Wilde and the “beloved creature” Virginia Woolf had similar ideas about food: the for-

mer couldn’t stand people who didn’t take eating se-riously, the latter believed that you cannot properly think, love or sleep if you haven’t eaten well.So they would certainly agree with the thinking of des Mets & des Mots, a place of food and words, opened in Milan in the former Richard Ginori factory. MeMo is not just a cooking school, but also a place of passion and culture in which to prepare Italian and French recipes while conversing in both languages. The image of the MeMo space reflects a spirit of pro-fessionalism and technology, a strong identity. But in the case of cooking, the atmosphere also has to have something of the home, leaving space for rec-ommendations and conversation, lessons and tast-

ings. MeMo has chosen elegant, functional, time-less furnishings. The pieces by De Padova respond to just these parameters: Quadrato tables, Cirene chairs, small Dan tables, Pollack chairs. Someone once said that good cooking attracts the good architect, and good design. Just consider the case of Ferran Adrià, who designs his dishes by composing and reassembling their parts. Or that of Jean Nouvel, who has designed the restaurant Les Ombres in Paris, a gastronomic win-dow on the continents, next to his new Musée du

Quai Branly.Not to mention, in Milan, Carlo Cracco and Moreno Cedroni, renowned chefs who work with the Trien-

nale: one in the main building, Palazzo dell’Arte, the other at the Bovisa branch.Ladies and gentlemen, dinner is served.

Two great culinary traditions for the cooking school and cul-tural association based in Milan, on via Morimondo, along the Naviglio Grande. The project of renovation of the former indus-trial zone of Società Ceramica Richard Ginori took nine months, under the direction of the architect Alessandra Ubertazzi.The founders of des Mets & des Mots are Ferdinando Tanara, an Italian in love with France, and Elisabeth Bertolino, Parisian by birth, now residing in Milan. The teachers are not profes-sional chefs but cooking enthusiasts. Every three months the school proposes a new schedule of initiatives, from classes on creative cuisine to lessons on French desserts.

DeS MetS & DeS MotS

cirene Dan pollack quadrato

DeS MetS & DeS MotS MeMo Milano, via Morimondo 26

SchooL aRea anD offIceSYear of construction: 2007architecture and interior design:Alessandra Ubertazziproject area: 200 sq meters

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| 1 4 | S E T T I N G S

voyage in the temple of words| p h o t o L u c i a n o S o a v e |

it is not easy to come to terms with a monu-ment, or to enter a temple. The Corriere della

Sera is both those things: a civic monument of Milan, and the temple of Italian journalism.

“La fabbrica del Corriere della Sera” is the title Vittorio Gregotti gave to the book, in 2006, that narrates his restructuring project for the head-quarters of the newspaper on Via Solferino, giving the monument-temple yet another character: that of industry (fabbrica=factory).

Via Solferino, via Moscova, via San Marco and via Montebello. The area where renovation work began in 1989 is bordered by these four streets, with buildings from the early 1900s by Luca Bel-trami, and more recent parts designed at the end of the 1950s by Alberto Rosselli.

Gregotti has written that he wanted his inter-vention to be one that “did not raise its voice”, im-plemented “with patience, making silence in order to be

able to see small things”. The appropriate approach to a temple-monument-factory.

Far from the din of fashion and the idea of over-ly technological, global communication. Concen-trating on the reorganization of spaces with an at-titude of respect for a job – journalism – that has radically changed in recent decades.

The Milan that continues to buy and read the Corriere della Sera still resembles, to a great extent, its temple-monument: tied to traditions, sober, even Calvinist. But also interested in new things,

to stimulate production, to create social identity. It is an aspect of the modern Milan that was

born in the 1950s.The same period in which De Padova was con-

tributing to educate the tastes of the city’s interior decorating.

So today it is almost to be expected that the new managerial offices of Corriere della Sera should be furnished with pieces by De Padova. First of all, the 606, the historic bookcase by the German de-signer Dieter Rams, created in wood in the 1960s, and transformed twenty years later by De Padova, by rethinking the piece in aluminium.

Other spaces feature the Shine collection by Vico Magistretti: white tables with a base in alu-minium alloy and cabinets with oak tops. Or the Tools series, designed by Pierluigi Cerri, a system of simple storage units and bookshelves, for infi-nite combinations.

That simplicity, to use the words of Vanni Pas-ca, design critic and historian, “that does not mean

reduction or displayed self-gratifying elegance, but a so-

lution to the complex theme of living in the home and

the office, an expression of the taste for inhabiting spaces

with nonchalant aplomb.” In the end, the encounter between Corriere del-

la Sera and De Padova was inevitable. After all, wasn’t it George Nelson, the icon of American de-sign, on his way through Milan, who called De Padova “the temple of Italian design”?

Where there’s INFORMATION, there’s De Padova. Taking the wrong path nourishes true love, we grow by accumulating

mistakes, not through easy victories. It’s hard to get away from logic, because improvisation is an art laborious to learn.

Excess leads to crimes, scarcity to slaves, in the middle are the infallible men, whom everyone talks about when they fall.

True information has the style of someone who knows how to emerge from a labyrinth without sweating.

RcS MeDIagRoUp Milano, via San Marco 21

RcS coRRIeRe DeLLa SeRa Milano, via Solferino 28

ManageRIaL anD SecRetaRIaL offIceSYear of construction: 2006architectural design: Gregotti & AssociatiInterior design: Franco De Nigrisproject area: 1,786 sq meters

ManageRIaL anD SecRetaRIaL offIceSYear of construction: 2007Interior design: Franco De Nigrisproject area: 300 sq meters

i n T h e c o R R i e R e d e l l a s e R a h e a d q u a R T e R s R e n o vaT e d B y g R e g o T T i

S E T T I N G S | 1 5 |

è De padova

p a u l k l e e z e n t R u m B e R n e

the outskirts of Berne. Where

the magical worlds of Paul Klee

appear against the backdrop

of the hills. evoking the three

waves of steel and glass

designed by Renzo Piano for

the Paul Klee Zentrum.

Opened in 2005, the centre

contains the bequest of the

heirs and the foundation, with

over four thousand works by

the artist, including small and

large drawings,watercolour

sand oil paintings.

Sixteen thousand square

meters, one thousand and

one hundred tons of steel and

abundant natural lighting for

exhibition spaces, refreshment

areas and offices, which Renzo

Piano has furnished with the

Silver chairs by De Padova, a

classic for both indoor and

outdoor use.

f R a l a R c h I t e t t u R e m e l e g n a n o

An architecture studio, in the

spaces of the ground floor and

first floor of a building from

the early 1900s. Restructuring

work was recently completed

on the exterior and the

internal spaces. the rooms

face a charming inner

courtyard. Architect Aldo

Ruffini has chosen the

historical center of Melegnano

(Milan) for his studio, which

works on civil and industrial

architectural projects. He

explains his choices as follows:

«i was looking for positive

symbiosis. i wanted to make

the original elements of

the building and part of

the original furnishings

coexist with the rational,

clean furnishings required

for contemporary work. in

this sense, the rationality

and linear design typical of

De Padova convinced me to

select certain pieces from the

collection».

«in other cases i have found

myself decorating spaces of a

different nature, and often i

have resolved conflicts of style

using products by De Padova»

in fact, in what Ruffini calls

the Drafting Room («even

though, he says, who draws

by hand anymore? At this

point all the work is done

with computers»), he has put

together a series of white

tools tables to take advantage

of the light. the Work chairs,

with orange seats, the light

wood floors and white walls

all contribute to capture and

reflect light. As in the meeting

room, where Ruffini has chosen

a large oval Shine table and

Silver chairs with white seats,

to coexist in harmony with

an antique walnut chest of

drawers.

On the walls, where the

offices require bookcases, the

choice went to the timeless

606 model by Dieter Rams,

a flexible, elegant, light and

perfectly symbiotic presence.

s o m e o f o u R c o n T R a c T c l i e n T s

A complete listing of our contract clients

and our dealers is available by request.

i n d u s T R y a n d c o m m e R c e

1. Barilla [Parma]

2. Bodum [Lucerne, Hornbaek, New york, Shanghai]

3. Disano illuminazione [Dorno (Pavia)]

4. ferrero Spa [Alba (Cuneo)]

5. finmeccanica [Hong Kong, Miami, Moscow, New york, Rome]

6. Mc Kinsey & Company [Milan]

7. Multiplex Pathé Lingotto [turin]

8. Rolex SA [Geneva]

fa s h i o n a n d a c c e s s o R i e s

9. Best Company [Carpi (Modena)]

10. Diego della Valle [Ascoli Piceno, Milan]

11. Hugo Boss [Zug]

12. Moschino [Milan]

13. tod’s Spa [Ascoli Piceno, Milan]

B a n k s , f i n a n c e , i n s u R a n c e

14. UBi Banche Popolari [italy]

15. Barclays Private equity [Milan]

16. Santander [Madrid]

17. Starfin [Lugano]

c o m m u n i c aT i o n , P u B l i s h i n g

18. De Agostini [Novara]

19. Peppermint [Munich]

20. RCS Corriere della Sera [Milan]

h o T e l s , R e s Ta u R a n T s , c a f e s , c l u B s

21. Café Wien & Restaurant [Kassel]

22. Carlton Hotel [Nuremberg]

23. Cipriani Club Residences [New york]

24. Hotel Chalet del Golf [Puigcerda (Girona)]

25. Hotel Reina Petronilla [Zaragoza]

26. Karnerhof SPA [Lake faak – Austria]

27. Mandarin Hotel [Barcelona]

28. Guastavino’s restaurant [New york]

29. Warmbader thermhotel [Villach – Austria]

P u B l i c a n d P R i vaT e i n s T i T u T i o n s

30. Airport of Palma de Mallorca [Palma de Mallorca]

31. CDi [Milan]

32. Proa foundation [Buenos Aires]

33. Hummer team LtD [Pafos – Cyprus]

34. ifAD [Rome]

35. tourism Port of Palau [Palau (Sassari)]

36. teatro franco Parenti [Milan]

37. tenaris University Residence [Campana – Argentina]

m u s e u m s a n d l i B R a R i e s

38. Centre G. Pompidou [Paris]

39. Prado Museum [Madrid]

40. the Morgan Library & Museum [New york]

p h o t o L u c i a n o S o a v e

Schöngrün reStaurantYear of construction: 2007architecture and interior design:Renzo Piano Building WorkshopProject area: 16.000 sq metersDealer:Teo Jacob, Berna

OfficeS, Drafting rOOm, meeting rOOmYear of construction: 2007interior design:Aldo RuffiniProject area: 90 sq meters

Shine 606 u.S.S. tools

p h o t o L u c i a n o S o a v e

iwas in the rest room at Penn Station in New York, ears ringing with the PA announcing my train,

when I heard a gunshot behind me. I turned around, slowly, but nothing was there. Maybe the shot came from

one of the stalls facing the wall of urinals. A few seconds earlier I had seen two people in front of the mirror, to

my right: a black guy with a garbage man jacket and a blond kid with hair gel. But now there was nobody, and the only certainty came from below:

I had pissed on my trousers and shoes.

I kept still for a few minutes, really scared, wanting to run far away, unable to move. Then, when I saw that nothing was happening, I

got up my courage and slowly opened all the doors of the stalls. I don’t know why I didn’t just get out of there. I felt a strange confidence.

I proceeded cautiously, as in a film: I leaned against the partition between the stalls, shoved the door open hard

and then pulled back, out of visual range. Useless precautions. If someone had wanted to eliminate me they

could have done so very easily already. As I was thinking these right things and doing the wrong ones, at the fifth

door I suddenly found myself looking at a man who had just blown his brains out. I don’t know how much time

had passed between the shot and my absurd actions, I only know that when I left the rest room to look for help Pennsylvania Station was

empty, yes, empty, unbelievable. Completely deserted, like a dream. I remembered a Terry Gilliam film where everyone suddenly starts

waltzing, and that would have been OK: with Tom Waits playing the hobo, too. But an empty Penn station was not OK. Either I was in

the worst of all nightmares or something outrageous was happening. I went back to the rest room, and when I looked

in the mirror I didn’t recognize myself: wasted, frightened, lost. And all around: silence. One truly long instant of

terror interrupted by the splash of the water I had turned on to stick my head under the flow. Don’t ask me how much

time had passed, I don’t know, I heard no noises, just emptiness. When I surfaced I tore some paper off the towel dispenser on the wall and, drying

my head, I went back over to the guy who had shot himself. He was still there. Blood on the tiles, face in a grimace, hole in the

temple. Like a painting by Bacon, I stupidly commented out loud, before taking a closer look at the guy. Shoes, jeans, jacket, sweater.

Pretty posh. The face had something familiar about it. Maybe he was famous? When I looked away, ready to leave, I almost closed the

door, as if to conceal the scene. Did I want to protect my discovery, or just protect the intimacy of that man, a bit longer, from prying

eyes? I did it without thinking, the door barely ajar as I left. Someone who decides to end it all at Penn Station wasn’t

all that concerned about privacy. At least I wouldn’t think so. At this time of day the station should be packed with

people, the rest room swallowing and vomiting men, instead there is just silence, the station is still empty. Trains

standing still, PA silent, and I am plunged back into my worst nightmare. What is happening in New York? I even took a furtive peek into

the ladies’ room, in front: but nothing. Incredible. I saw a man in a uniform, in the distance, heading into a corridor. I took off after him,

and no, not even then did I consider running away. I could have: I was all alone in one of the world’s biggest train stations, the

cop had his back to me, he hadn’t seen me, but my eyes were still filled with the face of that man, in a pool of blood.

«Even though humanity is strange, it is ours», my mother would repeat, looking in the mirror on Sunday morning before going to

church. Maybe it was just this phrase buzzing in my head that kept me from cutting and running. I caught up with the cop and convinced

him to follow me. And no, I didn’t listen to his voice, my eyes still held the explosion of the head of a man, which would be mine for the

rest of time. I didn’t hear the policeman’s questions, I was thinking about what would come after. And when we reached the rest room I realized that I

was much much older than my years, after that afternoon, that this was a falling point, of no return. You can’t know when you are on the wrong side of

the river. I repeated to myself, before noticing the red writing on the wall: To enjoy good health. An absurd phrase, in a

bathroom, without a signature, an epitaph for a suicide. I looked at the cop and with the tone of a radio announcer I told

him: «don’t worry, we’ve ended up in a story by Paul Auster».

NO USe tRyiNG tO eSCAPe I’m Nobody! Who are you? Emily Dickinson

| b y M a r c o C i r i e l l o |

t h e b i a n n ua l m a g a z i n e o f È De padova Strada Padana Super iore, 280. Vimodrone (Mi)

ARt DiReCtORS fRancesca cavazzuTi , maRio Piazza | teXtS 3d PRoduzioni | eDitORiAL COORDiNAtOR didi gnocchi | iNCiPitS AND SHORt StORy maRco ciRiello |

GRAPHiC DeSiGN AND LAyOUt 46Xy sTudio | PHOtOGRAPHS Paolo Riolzi , RoBeRTo Tomasi , luciano soave | eDitiNG AND tRANSLAtiON COORDiNAtiON maRTa monaco |

tRANSLAtiONS: eNGLiSH-TRansiTing.eu/sTePhen Piccolo, fReNCH-Régine cavallaRo , SPANiSH-nieves aRRiBas , GeRMAN-gunTheR f. Roeschmann |

iLLUStRAtiONS ale+ale | PHOtOLitH aRTicRom, usmaTe (lc) | PRiNtiNG gRafiche milani , segRaTe (mi) | tHANKS tO il sole 24 oRe, milano - Bodum, hoRnBÆk - TeaTRo fRanco PaRenTi , milano -

des meTs & des moTs, milano - Rcs coRRieRe della seRa , milano - Renzo Piano Building woRkshoP - RisToRanTe schÖngRÜn, BeRn - Teo jacoB, BeRn - aldo Ruffini , melegnano

| 1 6 | T h E S T O R Y