Milanese by birth, Cesare "Joe" Colombo was born into a family that owned an electrical equipment company. Knowing this industry from the inside will serve him well many times in the future. But first, Joe chose the path of an artist, having received an art education at the Brera Academy in the painting department, and only then graduated from the Milan Polytechnic. He was always surrounded by the environment of avant-garde artists. His brother Gianni was a bright representative of abstract-kinetic art.
Joe himself even joined the Nuclear Movement led by Enrico Bai and Sergio Dangelo, and worked for four years as an expressionist artist, graphic artist, and sculptor.
Joe Colombo in the Elda chair. On the wall is a collection of designer cradles
The future is somewhere nearby
The peak of Joe Colombo's creativity fell in the 60s, when humanity conquered space, developed the latest technologies and materials. It seemed that a grand future was about to arrive. Even then, Joe thought it was about innovation. "The way people live will be completely changed thanks to new audio and video advances. People will be able to study and work at home. Distance will not be decisive in the future."
"My design experience is the missing link in the evolution between the past and the future"
It is natural that the living environment of a person of a new formation will change, and he saw his mission as a designer in its formation. "These will be spaces that can transform, spaces that are suitable for meditation and experimentation, for intimacy and for communication."
"Traditional families tend to give way to small groups based on intimacy. We will have, in short, a natural tribal society... This group living and working together will require a new kind of environment: places that can be transformed, places that foster reflection and experimentation, intimacy and interpersonal relationships.” This is how he described the structure of the society of the future.
Joe Colombo. Elda chair sketch
Arrangement of gastrointestinal tract and "Hunger Games"
One of the icons of Colombo's creativity is the Elda chair. He named it after his wife and often took pictures in it with his favorite pipe. At the time, in 1963, it was the largest fiberglass object. It still has a futuristic look, and its characteristically shaped pillows that support ergonomics suddenly bring to mind illustrations from an anatomy textbook, where the intestine is depicted.
The interior of the television studio in the movie "The Hunger Games". Elda armchair and de Sede DS-600 sofa are in the frame
Moreover, the designer's familiarity with electrical engineering made it possible to make the chair turn 360 degrees. It was produced by the Comfort brand, and today by Longhi. Already today, the subject came to light in the fantastic dystopia "Hunger Games" directed by Gary Ross.
A modern interpretation of the Tube chair from the Cappellini company, which revived its release in 2016.
Is it a pipe?
In 1969, Joe invented the famous Tube chair - a combination of four hollow cylinders of different sizes, similar to giant soft hair curlers. They were made of PVC with polyurethane foam filler, and then covered with synthetic upholstery. Later, the choice of materials became more diverse — from leather to textiles. The cylinders themselves are interchangeable: they can be combined in any sequence, and they are connected by metal brackets with rubber fasteners.
Pencil drawing by Joe Colombo showing variations of the Tube chair, 1969.
Moreover, its compact packaging made a real revolution at the time: the cylinders were easily inserted into each other and packed in a tarpaulin-tube cover, similar to those used in tourist tents or sleeping bags. So Tube became a chair that could literally be taken off the supermarket shelf.
Initially, the chair was produced by the Flexform factory, but in 1976 it stopped its production. Only forty years later, the Cappellini company revived the project, giving it a modern reading and new colors, and even released a rug of the same name to pair with the Tube, with circles that resemble the silhouette of a chair.
Joe Colombo in an Elda chair with a glass of Smoke
Smoke comfortably!
Rumor has it that the Smoke glass, yes, the same one with the finger hole, was created by Joe Colombo for himself. He liked to go to cool bars, and he was annoyed by the fact that you can't hold a glass and a cigarette in one hand at the same time. He decided to remedy the situation by proposing a new construction of a seemingly archetypal object.
Joe Colombo. Pencil sketch of a Smoke glass
And, finally, one more fact. Joe Colombo lived exactly 41 years. He died on June 16, 1971, his birthday, of heart failure. Even in this he turned out to be extremely accurate.
