L'Italo-Americano

www.italoamericano.org 10 THURSDAY, APRIL 5, 2018 L'Italo-Americano LIFE PEOPLE MOVIES MUSIC BOOKS I talian design was only recently celebrated in LA with the Italian Design Day and it is once again time to talk about Italy's most cre- ative minds and their ties with the US. What's really striking, in the case we're about to see together in a few lines, is how these artists are the minds behind some of the most iconic pop culture symbols of the US - of New York, more specifically - yet their connection with them is barely know, at least to those who are not into the pro- fession. Lella and Massimo Vignelli were born and bred Italian, but made of the US their home and, I dare say, it is certainly in the US their designs got cult status. You wonder why? I'll give you a hint: the Bloomingdale's logo and the ageless 1970s New York under- ground map, both are the work of Massimo and Lella. A bit of background on the couple though: Massimo was born in Milan in 1931 and visited the US for the first time at the end of the 1950s. Shortly after, he and his wife Lella, it was 1960, opened the Vignelli Office of Design and Architecture in Milan: while Massimo was the more cre- ative side of their venture, Lella, well grounded and business savvy, got soon in charge of all that was related to marketing and finances. Don't be fooled: she was an architect, too, and knew how to be of immense inspiration for the company. In fact, Lella's experiences in design developed in Chicago, where she became, still very young, a member of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, just one year before founding the Vignelli Office of Design with her husband. She a graduate of the MIT School of Architecture, he of the Politecnico di Milano, their union speaks of Italian- American greatness even when it comes to the schools they attend- ed. Their very aim, perfectly achieved in life, was to be heart- and-soul Italians and heart-and- soul Americans at the same time, and it is a bit the symbol of how many members of the Italian- American community feel about themselves: equally attached to both countries, their personal identity the very mirror of the two places they carry within their heart. Torniamo a bomba, as we say in Italy: it's 1960 when the Vignellis open their design studio in Milan, both of them with American experiences on their shoulders. Six years later, they decided to open a New York City branch and that's when history was made, because that's the moment their influential hand began to create American master- pieces. One of the first was the logo for American Airlines: do you remember, the double capi- talized As in red and blue, with the stylized eagle in the middle? That was Massimo's work, so perfectly modern and essential - although he apparently didn't want to include the eagle in it, but was somehow forced to do it by company requirements - to FRANCESCA BEZZONE Hidden pop examples of Italian design: the work in the US of Lella and Massimo Vignelli last until 2013, when it was sub- stituted with the current simple, eagle shaped logo. And what about Blooming- dale's? Yes, another iconic sym- bol of America, at least in our European eyes: those elegant brown bags, with the clean, sim- ple yet incisive lettering, were his invention. And so it was, of course, the logo for the store itself: a fan of essential, mod- ernist designs, Vignelli was a supporter of only a few typed fonts, Helvetica above them all, but also Bauhaus typeface Futu- ra, the one he chose, in the 1970s, for the famous chain store. Leg- end says he came out with the idea only a few minutes after being given the assignment, but kept it a secret to justify the salary he had requested. True or not, Bloomingdale's certainly gained in popularity and sleek- ness, in all these years, much more than what it paid Vignelli for his instinctive creation. However, the most famous among all of Vignelli's works remains his 1972' s take on the New York subway map. So influ- ential was his work on it, that it recently became the subject of a whole book, Emiliano Ponzi's The Great New York Subway Map, commissioned by MoMA in New York and the New York Transit Museum. The book tells us the illustrated story of how Vignelli simplified the original confusing and intricate map: in the 1970s, NY subway was already enormous and complex, and navigating it wasn't as sim- ple as it is today, also because of how difficult it was to read its map. Vignelli, in his typical style, cleaned it out, simplified it, color coded it and transformed all twists and turns in 90 degrees angles, to make its reading more immediate. Even though it was substituted with another design in 1979 - some disliked the fact it didn't respect the city's actual topography - it is still considered one of the best examples of mod- ern designing and it is part of New York's MoMA permanent collection. And do you know that chair, the one you find a bit everywhere in public spaces, with a seat that looks like a folding napkin? Known, obviously enough, as the "handkerchief chair," it is another very popular design created by Vignelli. Lella and Massimo lived a life made of creativity, mutual respect, love and professional interaction: a well functioning example of how, when there's chemistry, everything can hap- pen. They also left this world only a couple of years apart, him in 2014, her in 2016. Their inher- itance lies in the company they funded of course, but also in the creative patrimony they have left us, a patrimony made in Italy, but that in a certain way changed a bit how America looks. Massimo Vignelli: his designs have also changed the way we look at America Lella and Massimo Vignelli, the power couple of Italian design: their ties with the US were deep and significant

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