Hasta La Ideas

Portrait by Lera Moiseeva

This is the latest installment of our Core77 Questionnaire. Previously, we talked to Albert Chu of Otaat.

Name: Luca Nichetto

Occupation: Designer

Location: I have two studios, one in Stockholm and another in Venice. So I have two teams and I travel back and forth. Normally I spend two weeks in Venice, two weeks in Stockholm and then one week who knows where.

Current projects: I’m working on a new sofa family for a Danish brand, as well as creating a new furniture collection with De La Espada. We showed several of the De La Espada pieces in New York last May, and we’ll show the complete collection in Paris in 2015. I’m also working with several other clients that I’ve had long-time relationships with, including Foscarini and some Scandinavian brands.

Mission: Right now, I really like to think about design as not only a way to make products and to create profit, but also as a nice platform for creating community. Whether it’s a small object or a big architectural project, after the idea has come up from your mind, you immediately start to have other people involved in it. And these people involve other people, so it quite quickly becomes a small community that’s working based on your idea. And this means that design is a really good tool from a social point of view, because it can create work and opportunity, and also help people have beautiful things around them.

Above and below: the Elysia lounge chair, part of Nichetto’s new furniture collection for De La Espada

Also new for De La Espada, the Stanley sofa and Laurel tables

When did you decide that you wanted to be a designer? To be honest, I didn’t decide. I grew up in Murano, a small island close to Venice famous for the production of glass. From when I was a kid, this super-creative environment was normal for me. And I was lucky to have a good talent in drawing, so the natural step was to study in art school to design glass. After school I started to design some pieces in glass, but without the idea that this was a job, to be a designer. Then I met the art director of Salviati, a famous brand in Murano, and he asked me if I wanted to design something for them. I designed a series of vases that quite soon became best sellers for the brand. After that, I started to look around, thinking about what I want to do, and it was a natural step to work on lighting. So I started to work with Foscarini, and in 2003 I designed a lamp called O-Space that gave me the opportunity to make some money and to run my first small studio, and also to be recognized by other brands. There was a company from the furniture industry that approached me, and I started to think about what I was. And I discovered that I was just starting a career as a designer.

Education: I studied at the Institute of Art in Venice, and after that I studied industrial design at the University Institute of Architecture of Venice.

First design job: The vases that I mentioned before. Their name is Millebolle; I designed them in 2000 for Salviati.

Who is your design hero? I have many design heroes. I really love design; I’m addicted, in a way, to the process. Because design, in my opinion, is not only about making objects but it’s also a kind of philosophy. So my heroes change depending on the time of my life. There are moments when I greatly enjoy the Scandinavian masters like Jacobsen or Wegner. Other moments I’m really into Castiglioni or Magistretti or Sottsass. And other moments I love the Eameses and Saarinen. It’s really difficult for me to say I have one hero.

Torei side tables for Cassina

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