Gae Aulenti Artemide Pileino Table Lamp

Materials: White round pivoting plastic base. White painted adjustable hat or helmet style aluminium lampshade. Bakelite E14 socket.

Height: 25 cm / 9.84”

Width: 22 cm  / 8.66”

Base: ∅ 18 cm / 7.08”

Electricity: 1 bulb E14, 1 x  40 watt maximum. 110/220 volt.
Any type of light bulb can be used, but a white/opal/frosted bulb is preferred.

Period: 1970s – Mid-Century Modern.

Designer: Gae Aulenti (1927 – 2012) in 1972.

Manufacturer: Artemide, Pregnana Milanese, near Milan, Italy. 

Other versions: The Gae Aulenti Artemide Pileino table lamp exists in three versions. Named Pileino, Mezzopileo and Pileo. They are named after the pileus. A Greek hat or a mushroom cap.

Designed by Gae Aulenti in the same year she participated in an exposition in the MoMA in New York about Italian design named “Italian: the New Domestic Landscape”. Together with Ettore Sottsass, Joe Colombo and Gaetano Pesce.

Gae Aulenti

Gae Aulenti, born 4 December 1927 as Gaetana Aulenti in Palazzolo dello Stella, Italy, some 90 km (56 miles) from Venice. She studied to be an architect at the Milan School of Architecture of the Polytechnic University (Politecnico di Milano), and graduated in 1954. Gae Aulenti began her career as an architect and freelance designer. She designed many interior designs and furniture for companies such as Fiat, Pirelli, Olivetti, Knoll International, Ideal Standard, Zanotta and Louis Vuitton.

Gae Aulenti designed lamps for among others: Artemide, Vistosi, Candle, Fontana Arte, iGuzzini, Poltronova, Stilnovo , Martinelli Luce.

The Harvey Guzzini Quadrifoglio is not a design by Gae Aulenti. It is published wrong in books. Gae Aulenti started to work for the iGuzzini company in 1985 and created together with Piero Castiglioni the (industrial) Cestello lamp for the Palazzo Grassi in Venice, Italy; 17 years after the Quadrofoglio was designed by Studio 6G, the Harvey Guzzini design-team.

Aulenti received many awards for her designs and she is seen as one of the greatest Italian designers after World War II. Gae Aulenti died in Milan on 31 October 2012, she was 84.

Artemide

The Artemide Group is based in Pregnana Milanese, Italy. The company is best known for the Tizio desk lamp designed by Richard Sapper in 1972 and the Tolomeo desk lamp, designed by Michele De Lucchi and Giancarlo Fassina in 1986.

Designers who have collaborated with the company include Mario Botta, Sir Norman Foster, Ettore Sottsass, Enzo Mari, Neil Poulton, Karim Rashid, Giò Ponti and many others.