FontanaArte Archive

For its 90th Anniversary, FontanaArte unveils its historical archive in the space dedicated to the exhibition FontanaArte, 90 Years of Light and Art, during the Milan Design Week from 6 to 12 June 2022.
Photographs, documents, sketches, registers, miniatures of products, objects and ideas: the FontanaArte Archive is, for the first time, brought back to light through a work of recovery, cataloguing and valorisation of the heritage that has made the brand a protagonist of excellence of made in Italy all over the world in the last 90 years. It is a first group of 580 objects, including 67 catalogues, 45 files of drawings and prints, 18 historical documents, 204 photographs and 16 large press cuttings that recount the work of the great designers who have accompanied the brand and made it an icon of design.
The digitalization and enhancement process was carried out by FontanaArte together with Promemoria Group, Italy's leading company specialising in revitalising the historical heritage of iconic brands and companies, cultural institutions and private collections.

The Digital Caveau®: the always connected archive
Thanks to the mapping of the existing material, the cataloguing method and the creation of interconnected cards, the Caveau Digitale® of FontanaArte becomes a fundamental tool of consultation and inspiration for internal and external collaborators, designers and media: a journey through Gio Ponti's original drawings, the contract signed by Max Ingrand in 1953 and the colour miniatures created by Luigi Fontana.

“FontanaArte's Digital Caveau is not just a collection of original pieces," comments Francesco Librizzi, artistic director of the brand. "There are drawings, fragments and prototypes of what the company has imagined over the years: a tool that can be consulted simultaneously by several people around the world to cross-reference data, build paths and open up to the outside world”.

"As Gio Ponti used to say, 'For life to be great and full, one must put the past and the future into it'. Here, for us the archive is the place of discovery,” recalls Andrea Montorio CEO of Promemoria Group, “in which to look for clues of a past that constantly speaks and confronts the present, overcoming it”.

ARCHIVE. The Secret Light
From FontanaArte's Digital Caveau® comes an enhancement project that focuses on the world of Archives and opens up to the general public.

On the occasion of Milan Design Week, FontanaArte, Promemoria Group and Altopiano Studio present ARCHIVIO. The Secret Light, a format that aims to tell the story of archives through the voices of those who are constantly in search of the unseen: archivists, the true discoverers and interpreters of signs. In this teaser, light becomes the driver of the tale and Fontana by Max Ingrand, lamp - icon since 1954, is transformed into a gateway to the brand's archival treasures.