Fashion Plates
Saint Laurent's participation in the upcoming Salone Del Mobile in Milan has quite the backstory: The fashion house's artistic arm, Saint Laurent Rive Droite, will exhibit plate designs that architect Gio Ponti created in 1957 for an exceptional villa in Venezuela.
Saint Laurent creative director Anthony Vaccarello is curating the display at the Chiostro Grande di San Simpliciano in collaboration with the Gio Ponti archive and the Fundación Anala y Armando Planchart. It will run from April 16 to 21.
In addition, Saint Laurent Rive Gauche commissioned Gucci-owned tableware and ceramics maker Ginori 1735 to reissue 12 of the plates. Ponti, who died in 1979, was once an artistic director at the Florentine manufacturer, prized for its know-how, colorful designs and meticulous hand-painting.
Anala and Armando Planchart, who made his fortune importing Cadillacs into Venezuela, chose
Ponti to design their dream home in Caracas, perched on a hill, its pinched shape vaguely inspired by a butterfly. It is considered a masterpiece of midcentury architecture.
Ponti not only designed the house but also incorporated furniture he had made by Altamira, Cassina and M. Singer & Sons, as well as lamp designs made for Arredoluce, Fontana Arte and other industrial design firms.
According to the
Villa Planchart website, the courtyard villa was designed to exalt the couple's art collection — which included an Alexander Calder mobile, Armando Reverón paintings and a Fausto Melotti ceramic mural — and their passion for orchids.
Ponti decorated the set of Ginori 1735 tableware, known as the Planchart Segnaposto collection, with symbols and motifs seen in the house. These include a sun, crescent moon, polar star and iterations of the letter "A" in homage to Anala and Armando.
The reissued plates, hand- painted at Ginori's Florentine workshops, will be sold as limitededition items on YSL.com, at the Saint Laurent Rive Gauche boutique in Los Angeles, the Saint Laurent Babylone book and record shop in Paris, and by appointment during Milan Design Week at the Saint Laurent flagship on Via Montenapoleone.
— MILES SOCHA