Throughout her career, few cast a longer shadow on the landscape of Italian design than Gae Aulenti. An architect, designer and creative polymath, she was born in the Italian region of Friuli Venezia Giulia in 1927, where her father worked as a tax collector and her mother as a school teacher. In 1953, she graduated from Milan’s Politecnico University, beginning a career spanning six fruitful decades. Aulenti is perhaps best known for her innate ability to beautifully integrate art, design and architecture. She could shift easily from large-scale public projects to intimate domestic spheres, and then toggle between styles without effort.
Her furniture, for instance, went from referencing Art Nouveau decorative details – as in the swooping shape of her bentwood ‘Sgarsul’ rocking chair from 1962 – to incorporating industrial and found materials, such as in her 1993 ‘Tour’ table made of tempered glass and four working bicycle wheels. However, the fil rouge that binds all her work is a clear-headed view towards the future – a fact that is now being celebrated in a wide-ranging exhibition, ‘Gae Aulenti (1927-2012)’, at Milan’s Triennale Design Museum, which runs until 16 October 2024.
