Roberto Lazzeroni develops spontaneously over short distances. A historical name in transalpine design, he is the creator of the collection that unites Poltrona Frau and Ceccotti.
A skein of sunlight crosses the enormous glass threshold of Iconno’s showroom on Jorge Juan Street in Madrid. It is a generous space, filled with delicious designer pieces that fill the eyes with greed and the bodies with tender softness. Furniture for enjoyment. And that transparent cellar constellated with wine bottles… A certain hustle and bustle is perceived, final preparations for the presentation of the Duo collection, born from the love affair between Poltrona Frau and Ceccotti Collezioni, Roberto Lazzeroni through. But that event is celebrated in the evening and we arrived early. Over there you see a guy dressed in black from head to toe. Stroll around, dodge the different pieces of Duo as a living room set up in the spirit of the pleasure of hosting. It’s Lazzeroni.
The photographer sits him in an armchair and the great Italian designer does his thing (we don’t know what they are, because they are his). Smiles, seriousness, grimaces, extravagant, respectable, hilarious, solemn postures, this character Roberto Lazzeroni. After the flashes We lounged on the sinuous Duo sofa (hey, it’s nice in here). “For me, design is… the job that I know how to do best, always, and with which I earn my living, and quite well [se ríe]. For me it is a useful form of art.” He speaks Italian. Get over that imposition that everyone-has-to-speak-English. I like this man. Especially when we ask him to describe the different elements that make up Duo. Answer: “Blah, blah, blah” while he shoos those words away with his hand.
If the question spurs you, speak. “The past is something conceptual, it is behind the idea, the mood of this collection. He wanted him to have features of the Italian 50s and 60swhen the country had just come out of the war and was experiencing the miracolo Italian, like the Milanese school. First, they thought about rebuilding after the war, there was a lot to do, but also rethinking the design. After fascism, the bourgeoisie wanted to renew the interiors of their houses, more modern, current, everything had to be more beautiful, new. There was an idea of the future that seemed like it was going to be better… Then we understood that it was not like that [se ríe]. It was the period of Sofía Loren, of the Vespa, of the Alfa Romeo. These objects breathe a little of that time, of that Italy. “It is the idea, to return to that period but you perceive that these furniture are not old, but rather you feel its contemporaneity, its novelty.”
Roberto Lazzeroni is a figure of transalpine design. His eyes have seen a handful of trends, schools and flows of thought pass by. He was born in 1950 in a small town between Pisa and Florence. In this last city he studied art and design, or not? “I have never studied. When I was a child I wanted to be an artist. I studied a little of everything, at the Artistic Lyceum, at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, in an experimental course, in those years everything was experimental, it was the 70s , rock music… I was studying Architecture and I met Adolfo Natalini [fundador en 1966 del movimiento arquitectónico vanguardista y postmoderno Superstudio], and from there I began to bring the two things together, art and architecture, the latter thought more as design, and at that time is when Radical Design was born, and Florence was the homeland of that movement, and that is how I started. Half artist, half architect, a little of both.”
Self-taught and designer above all
No portrait of his family tree indicated that Lazzeroni was going to opt for these design issues. His childhood town did, “because craftsmanship was very developed, especially cabinetmaking, in the construction of furniture. I lived as a child among logs and splinters, hence my love for wood. In life everything has a reason” . Do not deduce from this that he is a carver, not to mention. “As a craftsman I am null, nothing. I’m terrible at that, I don’t know how to do anything. Just design, work with this [se señala la cabeza desnuda, sin pelo, sí, calvo]which I think is the most important thing.” Radical Design, Sentimental Design, interior architect, in short, a plethora of names color his creations, his way of feeling and conceiving his designs, a personal universe that, in some way, united their destinations, back in 1988, to Ceccotti Collezioni, that Tuscan brand specialized in traditional cabinetmaking techniques born in 1956 (coming from the foundations of the Ceccotti Aviero company and, now, twinned with Poltrona Frau).
“Duo is the fruit of a rather unusual collaboration in the world of design. Ceccoti is a company with which I have always collaborated, my first collection dates back to 1988, which is many years. At one point Poltrona Frau acquired it and I think I have contributed a little to this marriage, because I think these companies had affinities between them. Both focus on craftsmanship, quality, well-made things and tradition, of course. So I asked myself: why can’t we try to bring these two excellences together? And what was the idea? Invent a totally different territory. Poltrona Frau has been in charge of the textile products, the sofa, the armchair, etc. And Ceccotti of the solid, rigid parts.”
For both brands, Lazzeroni acknowledges, this collaboration means leaving their comfort zone. “Ceccotti left his organic shapes, which is the trademark of his style, to enter a more rigid field but always with great elegance. For this sofa on which we are sitting we invented something different, taking one that Poltrona Frau made in the 50s… But it was not true, it was an invention. We invented this, we made a textile sofa when they had always made them out of leather, something unprecedented, it was not even in their catalog. This has also allowed Ceccotti to discover new systems. work. Look at that stool with gouges [esas hendiduras, a modo de escamas de la pata], ways that had never been worked on before. And in another piece of furniture that we don’t have here. [se refiere al Duo Cabinet] the wood is assembled in a way that is like something from the future, electronic. The result has been a new Ceccotti and a new Poltrona Frau, brought together in this collection. He has been very successful From a commercial point of view, we are delighted.”
La dolce vita according to Roberto Lazzeroni
That is. The past and the future. Two individuals who maintain their identity and share it. Memory and innovation. Retro silhouettes and contemporary context. Subtle romanticism. A two-piece sofa capable of modular expansion into curved shapes. An armchair with soft lines with elegant geometric motifs. A storage cabinet (the Cabinet) that reinterprets the classic 50s sideboard. Low tables. Stools. A solid ash bench. Lamps and mirrors.
Certain remembrances of la dolce vita? “Let’s not exaggerate, let’s not go overboard. Fellini’s is a wonderful film, but here I don’t really know if there is dolce vita… In Italy there is none, now life is bitter, That’s what we have; Now you are better than us, better.” Goodbye Mr. Lazzeroni. It has been a pleasure. I love his shoes: “They are from Jil Sander, they are not very radical, he has become very bourgeois.” I love this man.
Frau easy chair, piece of history
They are 1,400 square meters and they fall short. Such is the magnitude of Poltrona Frau’s history that can be seen along the route of its museum in Tolentino, lying in the production center where exquisite leathers are pampered. Precisely the mastery in working with them established this firm (founded by Renzo Frau in Turin in 1912) in this region at the beginning of the 60s. In a set designed by the great Michele de Lucchi There are emblematic designs such as the Vanity Fair and Lyra seats (in the image above), old advertisements, an original of the armchair (with ashtray) from 1919, seats from theaters, auditoriums, airplanes, Ferraris… By AR
Ceccotti, I pass by the workshop
Life placed Franco Ceccotti (founder of Ceccotti Collezioni as a spin-off of the family business), in the position of making a decision: without foreseeing a clear succession, he looked for someone to ensure the future of his employees, some very young, doing a job. He achieved this through an alliance with Poltrona Frau, with whom he shared the creative genius of Roberto Lazzeroni. Ceccotti tells it between freshly chipped wood shavings in the Cascina workshop, a stone’s throw from Pisa, where legs, backrests and seats are manufactured for designer furniture that does not understand fashion and does know a lot about chisel and hand sanding. By AR
