Capitello

Inspired by pictures of tourists taking a break, sitting in columns on the Acropolis in Athens, the Capitello was Studio 65’s entry to a DuPont competition, where the goal was to design a chair with material produced by the organizing company. The design process of this included the whole studio, from seasoned designers to newly hired students, and was long and laborious. The concept of bringing an archeological representation inside people’s homes was a way of demystifying Classicism and something symbolic of only empires. Launched in 1972, the seat fitted well into the Anti-Design movement, a school of thought that rejected modernist ideals of function above all else and focused on exaggerated traits. Anti-designers proposed ornamentation and decoration through bold colors, shapes, and materials, distorting scales and playing with the ideas and irony of different forms. Several Gufram furniture projects portray these ideals quite clearly.