Afra & Tobia Scarpa

Afra & Tobia Scarpa count among the most influential designers of the 20th century. The Italian couple significantly shaped the design aesthetic of the 1960s and 70s with their designs and worked for numerous renowned manufacturers such as Cassina, Knoll International, Molteni, Flos or B&B Italia. Afra and Tobia both studied architecture at the Università Iuav di Venezia and founded a joint studio in Montebelluna in 1960. Their designs are characterised by a balanced combination of craftsmanship, innovative design language and technical sophistication.

Afra and Tobia Scarpa achieved international acclaim with the Soriana sofa, which they developed for Cassina in 1968: its voluminous shape, exposed metal frame, and lack of a supporting internal frame made the sofa a style-defining icon of Italian design. They were awarded the prestigious Compasso d'Oro for the Soriana in 1970. The Bastiano sofa for Knoll (1961) and the 925 armchair, which is part of the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, also count among their most popularly nown designs.

In addition to furniture design, the duo also worked intensively on lighting, glass objects and architecture. In 1973 they designed the Papillon lamp for Flos, one of the first lamps to use halogen technology. In the architectural field, they worked closely with the fashion company Benetton for decades. They designed factories, showrooms, and offices—including in New York, Paris, and Treviso - and restored historic buildings such as the Villa Minelli.

Tobia Scarpa (born 1935), son of the renowned architect Carlo Scarpa, continued the family's design tradition. Many of his designs, often created in collaboration with Afra, can now be seen in the world's most important museums, including the Louvre in Paris, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, Cologne, and Munich. In 2008 Tobia Scarpa received the Compasso d'Oro for his lifetime achievement. Afra Scarpa (born 1937) passed away in 2011. Since 2020 Tobia Scarpa has once again been working with Cassina.