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Ettore Sottsass Jr. and Hans von Klier

Biography

Sottsass studied architecture at Turin Polytechnic before opening The Studio, his office in Milan, in 1947. In 1956 he moved to New York City to work with George Nelson.

Perry A. King studied industrial design in England before moving to Italy in 1964. King later worked as a design coordinator for Corporate Image, where he worked with Santiago Miranda to design many typefaces, books, and posters.

In 1969 Sottsass and King designed the bright red Valentine portable typewriter for Olivetti. Sottsass stated that it “was invented for use anyplace except in an office, so as not to remind anyone of monotonous working hours, but rather to keep amateur poets company on quiet Sundays in the country or to provide a highly colored object on a table in a studio apartment.”

Sottsass and King’s subversion of the idea of a typewriter as a practical instrument has profoundly influenced contemporary designers such as Philippe Starck, for whom usefulness is only one part of the design equation.

Works in the Collection

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