Design and luxury: contamination of different creative worlds

In addition to companies specializing in furniture, the architect and designer Carlo Colombo also collaborates with prestigious fashion and automotive brands. What is the relationship between design and brand? We talked about it at ‘Icone Talks’, the periodic appointment with the art director of Icone, Giulio Capellini.

The relationship with these companies linked to the world of luxury? For me it was a substantial change in the way of approaching design and interiors.

About seven years ago I started my collaboration with Bentley and Bugatti in the automotive world. I tried to interpret the DNA of these brands and these famous companies by tracing back to a small scale what their thinking and a history that has lasted for many years.

They are important brands, known all over the world, and it was not easy for me to be able to change my mind and my way of designing a bit.

The strength of the brand requires a change of approach

The attitude required is more severe and sharing. Normally a designer does this job because he feels free to almost ‘rape’ the blank sheet, to draw a sign that becomes a self-celebration of himself, because in the end we draw thoughts, emotions that turn into objects.

In working with the big luxury brands I had to put a 50% of Carlo Colombo and a 50% of these brands. They dictated, even if in a way that was always fully shared by me, the inclusion of materials, shapes, technologies, historicity, culture and DNA to create objects that in the end are linked to Bentley, Trussardi, Fendi, Bugatti because they totally represent their strategy and their historicity.

To do this, I had to personally share my travels and my time in their offices with the car or fashion designers, in order to understand exactly what the trends, inspirations and strategies were, also projected towards the future.

I was lucky enough to preview materials that were then presented two years later, but which we had already included in the collections.

Design, but also architecture

This then allowed me a series of knowledge within the world of real estate and to create architectural and interior projects, which are currently under construction, and linked to this branded world, which are working very well.

Despite the crisis linked to the pandemic or the economic crisis, the world of luxury always works very well, especially in Asia, where they are lovers of brands. This allows us to continue the journey not only in the field of design but also in the world of architecture.

Carlo Colombo, architect and designer.

Follow Icone Talks on the IGTV of the Instagram channel @icone.luce