REPORTAGE: Giulio Castelli by Cristina Morozzi

The ADI Design Museum inaugurated the exhibition on Giulio Castelli, founder of the historical company Kartell and the ADI itself. Read the reportage by Cristina Morozzi.

In Milan, on May 25th 2021, the Compasso d'Oro Museum was inaugurated in the new ADI headquarters in Piazza Compasso d'Oro - Via Ceresio 7 - with the exhibition "The spoon and the city" curated by Beppe Finessi.

The exhibition is dedicated to the historical collection of the Compasso d'Oro from 1954 to today, set up by Servetto&Migliore and accompanied by theoretical insights, dedicated to communication, graphics, historical design magazines and photography with images taken by great interpreters. 

As part of the planned program of exhibitions, on July 14th, was presented the exhibition dedicated to the entrepreneur Giulio Castelli, founder of Kartell and one of the founding fathers of ADI.

The exhibition, curated by Federica Sala, gave back a private image of his attitudes and passions, underlining the importance of the association with his wife, Anna Castelli Ferrieri, whom he met at the Polytechnic. She was one of the first women to graduate in architecture in Milan, and she's the author, together with the Gardella studio, of the Kartell headquarters in Binasco. 

The retrospective dedicated to Giulio Castelli, an innovative entrepreneur, is an opportunity to retrace a definitive history of plastic production and to recognize its role, both in the medical field (the test tubes) and in furniture.

Innovative forms and performances have changed our way of living, the result of the ideas of well-known designers and the technical innovations developed by engineer Castelli. 

Cristina Morozzi