Focused exclusively on interior design, an entire floor in the Superstudio Kafkův dům (Náměstí Franze Kafky 3, Praha 1) will be dedicated to Italian design. A joint effort between the Italian Cultural institute, architect Massimo Vignelli, president of la Fondazione NY and the Italian trade commission spawned a contest designed to highlight how Italian designers have stretched their creative and innovative talents, despite Italy’s most recent, challenging economic times.
Now owned by Italian brand Boffi, De Padova, set up in the 1950s by Fernando and Maddalena De Padova, is in a position to collaborate as part of an international joint distribution programme, sharing its design passion and Italian heritage with one of Italy’s revered luxury design companies.
This is a surprise, since earlier info suggested that since MK41 is somewhat larger than Sylver modules, only two launchers (for 16 cells in total) could be fitted: it appears it is not so, and the higher number of cells has been confirmed in the finalised design.
Unofficially, there have been strong suggestions that the lenghtening has been inspired by the wish to correct weight distribution, as the italian FREMM have been given the same huge main mast of an Horizon destroyer, carrying the heavy, powerful EMPAR radar system, and this has, again reportedly, made the ship remarkably bow-heavy, with consequences on handling, particularly in rough seas.
W. Women in Italian Design” traces a new history of Italian design in the feminine, reconstructing the figures, theories, and approaches to design that were sown in the twentieth century and that have taken hold, transformed and evolved in the twenty-first century.