Alessi was founded in 1921 by Giovanni Alessi, as a small company making silverware and kitchen utensils. Sometime around 1935 Giovanni's eldest son Carlo, who had studied industrial design, started to design items for his fathers company. Carlo did most of the designs for Alessi for the following ten years, and proceeded as Chief Executive after his father's retirement.
Together with his brother Ettore he began to call in free-lance designers - Carlo Mazzeri and Anselmo Vitale among others - and moved the focus of the product catalogue from everyday household items to more exclusive designer items, whilst maintaining usability and simple elegance in the spirit of the Bauhaus movement.
Over the years, Alessi has worked with more than two hundred designers, including names as Ettore Sottsass, Michael Graves, Massimo Morozzi, Philippe Starck and Enzo Mari, and the designer duo King Kong.

Website at www.alessi.it

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