Piero Fornasetti

Barnaba Fornasetti, Milan

Christie's Los Angeles, Important Design: The Life of Piero Fornasetti, May 16, 1998, lot 7

Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, October 2, 1991-January 19, 1992

Patrick Mauriès, Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, exh. cat., Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1991, pp. 107 and 117

Barnaba Fornasetti, ed., Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, New York, 2010, pp. 144 and 145 (for a photograph of Piero Fornasetti wearing the waist coat, 1980s)

In 1947 Piero Fornasetti designed his first waistcoats, one for himself and the other for fellow Italian designer and frequent collaborator Gio Ponti. He envisioned these vests as suitable attire for their line of creative work and titled them “Architetto” or architect. Employing his typical lithographic trompe l’oeil technique, Fornasetti transformed the vest’s silk surface into the façade of a palazzo; on either side he also printed the drafting tools of the trade, including a pencil, ruler, protractor and compass that appear ready to be pulled out of a pocket and put into action. Fornasetti went on to release an entire line of waistcoats in the 1980s, each decorated with the recognizable devices of other professions from doctor to fisherman. In doing so he elevated this element of a man’s uniform into a bold fashion statement.