Ceretti / Derossi / Rosso

Giorgio Ceretti (1932-), Pietro Derossi (1933-) and Riccardo Rosso (1941-), founders of the Strum Group, are a trio of Turin architects and designers active in the field of Radical Design. All three trained in the architecture faculty of the Polytechnic of Turin, they began to collaborate at the end of the 1960s, designing the interiors of two discos that would become a symbol of the new way of understanding nightlife for young Italians of the time: the Piper Club of Turin and L'Altro Mondo of Rimini. The beginnings of the collaboration with Gufram also date back to 1966, with playful and provocative furnishing projects. However, the light nature of their creations should not be misleading: the three architects were deeply engaged in the cultural and political movements of the time, carrying forward their revolutionary ideas through articles, seminars and even exploiting an unusual medium such as the photo novel. In 1971 these dynamics culminated in the foundation of the Strum Group, with the addition of Carlo Gianmarco and Maurizio Vogliazzo to the initial members. The name of the group derives from the expression "instrumental architecture": for the members of the collective, architecture was in fact understood mainly as an instrument of social and political struggle, in line with the ferment that characterized post-1968 culture. Also in the same year, their most famous creation, the iconic Pratone seat, was put into production by Gufram. In 1972 the Strum Group was in the foreground at the famous MoMA exhibition “Italy: The New Domestic Landscape”. It will then be the protagonist of several international performances during the 1970s until it finally disbands between 1975 and 1976.