Gucci Paints Milan Design Week Ancora Red

Is there anything more frustrating than when something doesn’t come in your favourite colour? It’s a thought that must have crossed the mind of Gucci’s creative director Sabato de Sarno, who's made it no secret that his favourite colour, a glossy cherry red dubbed Ancora Rosso, would play a vital role in his takeover of the Italian mega-brand. Having already swathed Gucci bags, tailoring, shoes and more in the deep crimson hue, for this year’s Salone de Mobile Milano, he’s turning to furniture.

An homage to Italy's rich design heritage, Sabato along with co-curator Michela Pelizzari of the Milan-based creative agency P:S, and Spanish architect Guillermo Santomà present Gucci Design Ancora. The special project is comprised of a re-edit of five iconic Italian designs from the likes of famed creatives like Mario Bellini whose already striking Le Mura sofa for Tacchini is reimagined in glossy Ancora red leather.

‘Through Design Ancora, Gucci doesn’t simply celebrate old icons, it creates new ones,’ explains Pelizzari. ‘The aura emanating from the brand spotlights five pieces by Italian masters that are perfect from a design standpoint but less known to the general public.’

While one of the earliest works by Bellini — initial sketches of Le Mura dating to 1972 — it’s by no means the oldest. That honour belongs to the Clessidra rug based on a drawing by the renowned Milanese artist Piero Portaluppi in 1926. The artist, architect, and historian’s great-grandson Nicolò Castellini Baldissera and Italian rug-maker cc-tapis, known for their commitment to artisanal handcrafted techniques, translated the geometric sketch into an ornate pattern rendered in red giving it a striking depth.

To showcase the Design Ancora collection, Gucci tapped Barcelona-based architect Guillermo Santomà to create an immersive display at Gucci’s Via Monte Napoleone, 7 flagship store. Not your average furniture showroom, the space is swathed in a sickly neon green. Organic curved walls add an unsettling energy to the liminal space, culminating in a striking backdrop to the romantic deep red furniture.

‘If we had put the objects all together, we would have created a living room. Instead, we decided to remove the boundaries given by how we use these objects and create a sort of limbo,’ explains Santomà. ‘Floating objects don’t have meaning or a function. They are just shape, materiality, colour.’

Nanda Vigo’s Storet chest of drawers, with its instantly recognisable rounded design, sits adjacent to Tobia Scarpa’s Opachi vase. Against the vibrant green setting, Gau Aulenti and Piero Catiglioni’s Parola lamp from 1980 appears like a floating balloon held up by a transparent circular base.

With Gucci Design Ancora, these icons of Italian design transcend their primary function as practical objects. Challenging viewers to explore the ever-evolving landscape of contemporary design as a medium for poetic expressions of shape, materiality, and colour. And while de Sarno only has two season's under his Gucci belt, he's showing no signs of letting go of Ancora Rosso anytime soon.

On 21 April a special edition of the Ancora Design project will be available on gucci.com.