Achille Castiglioni

Achille Castiglioni – Two brothers rethink the familiar

Achille Castiglioni was born in Milan on 16 February 1918. The second son of the famous sculptor Giannino Castiglioni, like his older brothers Pier Giacomo Castiglioni and Livio Castiglioni, he studied architecture at the polytechnic in Milan. After graduating he joined his brothers, who had been running a shared office in Milan since 1938 and had designed an extremely successful radio device in collaboration with Luigi Caccia Dominioni. Whilst Dominioni and a few years later Livio Castiglioni went their own ways, Giacomo and Achille continued working together and had a number of successes with their simple, emphatically objective style, which earned them their reputation as the most important post-war Italian designers. Occasionally they took existing products apart and rebuilt them in a completely unexpected, unorthodox way such as with the standard lamp Toio where a car headlight was mounted on a steel rod; the original piece, together with the hanging lamp Parentesi, were acquired by the New York Museum of Modern Art.

Two brothers change the design world of the 20th century

Achille Castiglioni continued the incredibly successful collaborative work with his brother Pier Giacomo until Pier’s sudden death in 1968 at the age of 55. A few earlier, the brothers had celebrated one of their greatest achievements, the Arco standard lamp for the manufacturer Flos, which is still regarded as an icon of modern industrial design. The brothers wanted to achieve the effectiveness of a ceiling light with a standard lamp to avoid damaging the ceiling – they found the answer literally on the street. They adapted the principle of the streetlight, which despite being fixed to the ground, could illuminate a radius of several meters. A block of marble served as anchor. They had further success with the Lierna chair made of leather-upholstered plywood, and which in 1958 heralded a new era. The model Mezzadro was particularly original, using a tractor seat as a base. The design world of the 20th century would look completely different without the work of the Castiglioni brothers – the influence of the resourceful Italians cannot be underestimated.

Every piece of design by Achille Castiglioni has its own story

Achille Castiglioni carried on his innovative work without his brother and the success continued seamlessly. He summed up the recipe for good design: One must start from scratch, not comfortably build on that which already exists, and above all keep both feet on the ground, go through life with eyes open and an eye out for the right inspiration. This attitude characterised Achille Castiglioni’s entire oeuvre – designs weren’t made thoughtlessly and for their own sake; each design had its own story to tell. There was always a certain chain of thoughts and considerations that almost inevitably led to the respective goal.

Achille Castiglioni died on 6 December 2002 in his birth and hometown of Milan.