Trained at the (former) school of communication and design “Università del progetto” in Reggio Emilia, then gaining experience as a senior designer in the studio-workshop Matteo Thun & Partners in Milan, Simone Cagnazzo, born in Lecce in 1978, continues to shape new ideas today in his Studio Cagnazzo, with a team of professionals in various fields of design and creativity (illustrators and artists, writers and photographers, architects and videomakers).
Focusing more on entire collections than on single products, Simone Cagnazzo also helms the home furnishings Liu Jo Living, the Italian producer of clothing founded in 1995 by Marco Marchi, later also extending into the world of furnishings.
“My premise is that every product is a business, and that companies should be run in a certain way. Many of the young people who approach design today already have available resources from the start, but having this margin of safety is not helpful. My parents were workers, they made ceramic products for their entire lives: if I hadn’t received study grants, I would never have been able to study at UdP.”
Ironically enough, then, you too have had experience with ceramics.
At the age of 28 I began my career as a freelancer, opening my own studio in Modena and coordinating art direction projects for the Iris Ceramica group. We worked on catalogues, trade fairs, plus all the showrooms and the internal displays. Since there was no graphic product of “impact,” to work with images creativity was a must. This made the job interesting and fun, but also a bit all-consuming.
With Liu Jo Living, on the other hand, the image is already there. Does this you’re your work easier or harder?
With them I have to put maximum effort into design, because it is necessary to grant an identity to a product that is part of a brand that has very high technical and qualitative standards, but with a correct, democratic price target.
How do you manage to “personally” oversee all the various aspects of the design and communication of a collection?
I rely from time to time on various freelance professionals, with whom I establish synergy to curate the graphic design, communication, web design and renderings. Depending on the type of project, each time I form a special work team with the objective of controlling all the phases.
What type of products do you create for Liu Jo Living?
They are soft, sinuous and elegant. Most of all, they have a definite character: not to break the mold, but to be as captivating as possible. I like the idea that the people who use a product will fall in love with it, triggering an almost personal relationship: in my view, this should be the goal of any designer. The difference comes from the empathy created with the object.
And how do you formulate an object “to be loved”?
I assign great importance, for example, to proportions, which have to be right and never exaggerated. The back of a sofa is not made like this “because this is how it is done,” but has to be a solution that offers the right sort of comfort, without overlooking the aesthetic side, which is not just an indulgence.
Today, furthermore, there is the obligation to consider sustainability.
This is why I have asked Liu Jo Living for all the sofas to have entirely removable covers: when necessary, out of mere boredom or due to wear, they can be stripped down and covered anew. By request, the brand itself supplies the “replacement covers,” and this offers clients greater personalization, while also giving the product a longer life. Besides using recycled materials or those with the least environmental impact, it is very important to educate people, teaching them to choose high-quality items. Only quality, in fact, remains, and allows us to consume less and to reduce waste.
