With a very personal and varied creative path, the architect Italo Rota, who died in Milan at the age of 70, has proven to be one of the most interesting and multifaceted contemporary figures not only on an Italian but also international level, capable of ranging from museum displays to boutiques for the designer Roberto Cavalli, passing through luxury hotels and pavilions of Expo 2015 in Milan and Expo 2020 in Dubai. It stands out among the emblematic projects of his varied production the new Museum of the Twentieth Century at the Palazzo dell’Arengario in Piazza Duomo in Milan (2002-10).
At the beginning of the 1980s, Rota left Milan, where he was born on 2 October 1953 and where he trained, to move to Paris to take care of the museum layout of the Musée d’Orsay, having won the competition for the transformation of the station he had participated in collaboration with Gae Aulenti in 1980. During the years of his stay in France he created the exhibition ‘Créer dans le Crée’ in Paris at the Center George Pompidou (1986) and the new rooms of the École française in the Cour Carré of Louvre (1992), as well as the urban development of the center of Nantes (1992-95).
Having returned to Milan in 1996, two years later he founded the Italo Rota & partners studio which is entrusted with large international projects – from product design to the design of large urban areas – characterized by the choice of innovative materials, cutting-edge technologies and in-depth research on the light. Rota’s most recent creations include: the Just Cavalli boutiques in Milan (2004), Dubai, Beirut, Mexico City, Hong Kong and Shenzhen (2005) and in Shanghai, Las Vegas, Verona, San Diego, Istanbul, London and New York (2007); the project for the redevelopment of the Foro Italico seafront in Palermo (2005-06), Roberto Cavalli’s house in Florence (2006-08), the Ciudades de Agua exhibition pavilion at the Zaragoza Expo (2006-08), the offices private individuals and the urban park of the Maciachini shopping area in Milan (2006-09), the Roberto Cavalli boutique in Paris (2008-09), the renovation and interior design of the Boscolo Palace Hotel in Rome (2009-10).
Rota also carried out an intense theoretical activity which led him to publish books and essays. Since 2010 he has been director of the Design department at the Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti in Milan. Among the many awards he received the gold medal for Italian architecture for public spaces (2006) and the Marble architectural awards (2010), as well as the Landmark Conservancy Prize in New York in 1996 and the Grand Prix de l’Urbanisme in Paris in 1994.
Italo Rota’s training began in the Seventies, first in the studio of Franco Albini and later in that of Vittorio Gregotti, during which he worked on the design of the University of Calabria.
Before graduating in 1982 from the Polytechnic of Milan, Rota carried out important jobs that would prove decisive for his subsequent professional and personal career. Among these, the creation of the ‘Lotus international’ magazine (1976-1981) with the architect Pierluigi Nicolin and, above all, the transformation of the nineteenth-century Gare d’Orsay building into the current Orsay Museum in Paris, an impressive renovation carried out in collaboration with Gae Aulenti. Rota spent over ten years in France, during which he organized many exhibitions and carried out some important renovations: the Museum of Modern Art at the Center Pompidou (with Gae Aulenti); the new rooms of the French School on the Cour Carré of the Louvre; the renovation of the center of Nantes, as well as the lighting project for Notre Dame in Paris (1991-2000).
Having returned to Italy in the mid-nineties with his new Milanese studio, Rota began to range from masterplan to product design, in projects characterized by the “choice of innovative materials, cutting-edge technologies and in-depth research on light”.
Compared to the first years of work in France, one can glimpse in his subsequent works (in particular in the interior and exhibition projects which represent the majority of his works) a more radical turning point which incorporates the lessons of the twentieth century avant-gardes, bringing him closer to forms of art and architecture less linked to the mainstream or purely constructive aspects. His impressive personal collection of ‘objets trouvés’, which ranges from books to the most original and diversified collector’s materials, also bears witness to this. Standing out in his production are the promenade of the Foro Italico in Palermo (Gold Medal for Italian Architecture for Public Spaces 2006) and the Museo del Novecento in the Palazzo dell’Arengario in Piazza Duomo in Milan (2010). In this latest work, the famous Milanese square is enriched “with a functional Museum Island, thanks to the integration with the historic museum of Palazzo Reale”.
Rota’s work explores the facets of contemporary complexity, with the aim of recreating emotions and inducing reflections, also enhancing the value of even small objects, in a complex anthology of signs in which everything is filtered, hybrid and experienced. In this global sharing, everything contributes to becoming architecture and everything contributes to dialogue, as well represented in the interactive space of the Kuwait Pavilion, created by Rota for Expo 2015 in Milan together with the Italian Wine Pavilion.
Rota’s collaboration with the stylist and entrepreneur Roberto Cavalli was intense. In addition to numerous boutiques and clubs spread throughout the world (Miami, Moscow, Delhi), Rota also designed the famous designer’s Florentine residence (2008). In recent years the Rota studio has designed several luxury hotels.
In addition to France, where he lived for almost twenty years, there are numerous works created internationally, including: the Casa Italiana at Columbia University in New York (1997), the Hindu Temple in Mumbai (2009), the Chameleon Club at Byblos Hotel in Dubai (2011).
Recently the Rota Building Office studio was assigned the construction of the Italian Pavilion at the 2020 Dubai Universal Exhibition, in a partnership with Cra-Carlo Ratti Associati, F&M Engineering, Matteo Gatto & Associati. A project that recounted the beauty of Italy through its many contaminations of arts, cultures and talents.
Sangiuliano: “With the passing of Rota we lose a master of design”
“With the passing of Italo Rota we lose a master of Italian architecture and design“. This was stated by the Minister of Culture, Gennaro Sangiuliano. “From theatrical sets to the creations of museums and public spaces such as the Museo del Novecento, Rota has been able to combine beauty and functionality, giving life to innovative works of great emotional impact, with particular attention to the valorisation of cultural heritage and the creation of spaces of meeting and dialogue”.
Venice Biennale: “With Rota we lose a visionary designer”
The Venice Biennale, chaired by Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, expresses “deep condolences for the loss of Italo Rota, a visionary Italian planner and designer and is close to the family’s pain”. “Italo Rota had been collaborating for some time with Carlo Ratti, artistic director of the Architecture sector of the Biennale, on innovative ideas attentive to sustainability and the circular economy – we read in the Biennale’s message – Rota had a very specific idea: the happiness of architecture” .
