IV
Werther Toffoloni
Born in 1930 in Udine, where he
passed away in 2017, he dedicated
himself to teaching and industrial
design for more than fifty years.
Werther Toff oloni was a great chair maker.
Among the fi rst industrial designers from
Friuli, Toff oloni was involved in the histories
of many local manufacturers with his idea
of design as “a serious matter, based on the
correctness of the product – that is,
on comfort, resistance and quality of form”.
Toff oloni identifi ed in tradition the
strength of what, through the fi fties and
sixties, was starting to establish itself as
the chair triangle. It is no coincidence that
among his fi rst creations there was the
restyling of the Marocca, the typical Friulian
chair with straw seat, revisited, fi rst of all, to
understand what could be the result of such
an operation: reinterpreting a traditional
term “with a little attention to design”.
The ability to evolve traditional shapes
to make them attractive to the market would
become Toff oloni's stylistic code, as well as
the reason why Billiani commissioned him
from 2004 with the brief to create for the
company, recently arrived in the universe
of design, fresh but reassuring products.
Chairs that with their seriousness tell
a piece of local history.
