Armani Casa matches artworks and furniture to create timeless compositions

Rare is the fashion house that finds the elixir to longevity: a leader inextricable from the brand’s identity, a timeless appeal, and an ability to pivot across creative disciplines with conviction. One such brand is Giorgio Armani – founded almost five decades ago, it continues to be steered by its razor-sharp founder, and its blend of geometry, clarity and quality remain as intact and alluring as ever. 

Living with Armani Casa

In 2000, the brand unveiled Armani Casa, a full-scale expansion into the interior design world, with wide-ranging offerings in furniture, accessories and decorative objects, and later, an in-house studio in charge of Armani-branded hotels and residences. Now, Armani Casa is entering another creative sphere: art, with a new project aptly titled Art & Armani Casa. Art directed by Nick Vinson of Vinson & Co, the project sees emblematic pieces from the brand’s collection paired with important art and artefacts, ranging from Roman antiquities to contemporary works, intersected by prime examples of modernism. ‘This project is a celebration of the timeless value of beauty, brought out in all its clarity by a series of unexpected and inspiring conjunctions,’ says Mr Armani. ‘I have always worked by means of subtraction, eliminating what is not necessary to highlight the material, design and workmanship. Pieces of furniture are made to stay: compared to fashion, they have an extended lifespan, which shines through in these images with exciting intensity.’ 

The pairings are not an instruction, but a taste of the look and feel of living with Armani Casa. There are no half measures for the project’s debut, which features work by leading modern masters, including Mario Merz, Eduardo Chillida and Jean Dubuffet, alongside contemporary talent, such as Eleni Vernadaki, Roberto Ruspoli and Maximilien Pellet. 

Venetian plaster walls and travertine floors offer a pure, minimal canvas on which to spotlight these visual assemblages. In one of them we find Armani Casa’s ‘Osimo’ sofa co-starring in a duet with Chillida’s 1985 untitled ink drawing, which has been turned into a limited-edition rug by Alfombras Peña. Known for his monumental sculptures, the Spanish artist was just as adept on paper. His mostly black-and-white works carry weight and depth, but also a delicacy and dynamism echoed in the volumes of the ‘Osimo’.

In another composition, Armani Casa’s ‘Rosemond’ table, in brushed brown ash wood and satin light brass, sits beneath a vortex-like work, in acrylic on jute, by Italian artist Merz. On the table are three busts by Spanish artist Sergio Roger, meticulously formed in antique linen rather than plaster or marble. 

‘Whether it is a painting by a living artist or a classical sculpture, I find in these artefacts the same drive towards the essence, the same linear taste, the same careful attention,’ says Mr Armani. ‘It is proof that true modernity is classic, and that the classic expresses absolute modernity, which is the essence of Armani Casa.’ An eclectic meeting of eras and styles, Art & Armani Casa reminds us that, in a digitised world, there is no substitute for the real deal.  

INFORMATION 

armani.com/casa