Luigi Caccia Dominioni

"Luigi Caccia Dominioni (1913-2016) was one of the great protagonists of twentieth-century Milanese architecture. A pupil of Piero Portaluppi at the Milan Polytechnic, he held the role of trusted architect of the good Milanese bourgeoisie throughout his very long career. Career that began immediately after his graduation with the founding of a studio together with Livio and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni, with whom he would work until the outbreak of the war. Instead, his encounter with product design dates back to 1947, when Azucena was founded together with Ignazio Gardella and Corrado Corradi Dell'Acqua, which will produce the furniture designed by the three. His architectural language was marked by a sober functionalism and devoid of apodictic formal principles, thus allowing him to adapt his projects to the different needs of the client with a certain degree of eclecticism: excellent examples of this are architectures such as the condominiums in via Nievo or the palazzo in Corso Monforte (1963-64) today the headquarters of the Flos showroom. The same characteristics can also be found in his furnishings, of which the Catilina chair is emblematic, however often enriched by precious and refined details that bring them closer to the forms of furniture from the beginning of the century. After his death, Azucena was taken over by B&B Italia, while some doors designed by him were reissued in series by Lualdi.