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Kartell + lapo. It's a wrap!

Lapo Elkann and Garage Italia Customs are reinterpreting Kartell's icons

Lapo Elkann and Garage Italia Customs are reinterpreting Kartell’s icons, using car wrapping technology to create a special limited-edition collection. The flagship store in Via Turati will be transformed into a true hotbed of creativity, where Kartell products will be customised with exclusive artistic reinterpretations inspired by the traditional colours of automotive nations and worlds, along with patterns from the world of fashion such as houndstooth, pinstripe and tartan.

One word: contamination. Of styles, languages... and “worlds”. This is something Kartell and Lapo Elkann have in common: the desire to contaminate both worlds freely. Why? Because it is only through creative freedom and the courage to express your own visions and aesthetic intuitions that radically innovative, unconventional, successful and, above all, fun projects are born. Out of this spirit of a shared and uninhibited creative dialogue, what arose was a collaboration that aims to endure through its different variations and whose first collection inspired the idea behind Kartell’s Fuorisalone 2016.

The “Kartell+Lapo. It’s a Wrap!” event, which will be dominating all of the store windows, revolves around the value of Italian artisanship and dreamlike dimensions. Within our flagship store we will be opening a “garage of dreams”, where the Garage Italia Customs experts will make customers’ dreams come true, breathing new life into Kartell furniture with a personalised touch. Through Garage Italia Customs, Lapo Elkann has customised Kartell products using wrapping, a technique that involves covering the surface with a special film. It is the first time that this procedure has been used with Kartell furniture.

Displayed on an electric blue lino floor with an embossed circle pattern will be around forty of Kartell’s iconic products, personalised with graphics inspired by the automotive and fashion worlds. Two different styles are on display in the brand’s store windows.

• The elliptical Glossy tables by Antonio Citterio, the Componibili by Anna Castelli Ferrieri and Philippe Starck’s transparent icons like Uncle Jim, Louis Ghost, Ghost Buster, One More Please, Tip Top, Lou Lou Ghost and the Invisible Side table by Tokujin Yoshioka, have been “wrapped” in designs drawing inspiration from the colours of national flags and reinterpreting or borrowing details from the motifs and colours of famous racing liveries.

• The same icons are also being displayed in plastic wrappings featuring completely different patterns, this time from the world of fashion and textile design, such as houndstooth, tartan and pinstripe.

It is therefore surprising to see the same icons speaking a completely different language depending on whether they are dressed in a more graphic, pop look, or a plainer style. One example is the Componibili, shown in a fun two-colour version and a pinstripe pattern.

Claudio Luti, President of Kartell, said, “Today Kartell is a lifestyle brand with such a global reach that it is able to embark upon collaborations and special projects with a freer and more relaxed approach towards its products. The collaboration with Lapo Elkann is very intriguing because his entrepreneurial approach is unconventional, uninhibited by trends, genuinely creative, and supported by significant commercial insights. And this combination of Lapo’s and Kartell’s imaginations forges new opportunities to develop the very concept of personalised industrial design. Nowadays consumers want to feel more of a part of their purchases by influencing them with their own creative vision (from cars to houses and furniture). I have found it particularly stimulating having our icons interpreted with new patterns and colours in a limited run, and I think that this collection may introduce a new way of interpreting the potentials of Kartell products without straying from our industrial approach.”

Lapo Elkann adds, “When I created Garage Italia Customs I knew that our objective was not to limit personalisation to the automotive world, but to translate its creative potential to many other sectors. For our first contamination with the world of furniture and design, we could not have found a better partner than Kartell. As a symbol of Italian creativity and design, Kartell has numerous true icons of contemporary design to its name and shared its continual experimental and innovative research, combined with the use of advanced technology, with Garage Italia Customs. The perfect synergy that has been created between our two organisations has allowed us to meld design, cars and lifestyle into unconventional furniture with a new and unique personality.”

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