Corrado Corradi Dell’Acqua

Corrado Corradi Dall’Acqua (1905-1982), entrepreneur, jurist and amateur writer, is remembered today above all for his role in founding the historic Milanese furniture brand Azucena. The company, founded in 1947 and a protagonist in the years of reconstruction of the city after the destruction caused by the war, took its name from that of Corradi Dall’Acqua’s dachshund dog, which in turn was inspired by that of a character in Giuseppe Verdi’s opera “La Traviata”. Corrado Corradi Dall’Acqua founded Azucena in collaboration with two great Milanese architects: Ignazio Gardella, his childhood friend and fellow student at the Berchet High School in Milan, and Luigi Caccia Dominioni, who designed many of the brand’s most famous products. Always a shy and withdrawn figure, Corradi Dall’Acqua often left the stage to his two more established colleagues, but contributed personally to designing some appreciated products such as the characteristic “Coppa Aperta” lamps, designed in collaboration with Gardella and used on all the old Milanese trams. His interest in design had already been shown sporadically in the 1930s with his participation in various Triennials in which he exhibited objects he personally designed such as a bookend or a tea service. Some of his most famous creations are now re-proposed by the Tato Italia brand.