Mario Bellini

Mario Bellini

Born in Italy in 1935, graduated from Politecnico, Milan with an architecture degree in his early twenties and started working as an architect in the early 1960’s. He’s an enthusiast art collector and also designs art exhibits. In 1987 he showcased a personal retrospective in the museum of modern art in New York. At the time, 25 of Bellini’s designs were already displayed in the museum, such as his Cab Chair, designed by him for Cassina and the office collection he designed for Olivetti. Bellini views the items he designed as “inventions who combines behaviors and sensual experiences beyond their usual role.” When he was asked to describe his design process he answered: “I would like to treat each project as a new discovery, as a curiosity angle, as maximal mental open-minded thought and a renewed creative energy. I don’t wish to recycle the same old clichés from the past, but I still hold the same design approach that I had since I first started. My motto is if you must do something – do it well and be dedicated to it.”