Bocca®: 1970 - 2020, 50 Years of a Myth

11/11/2020 - Gufram celebrates 50 years of the original Bocca® lip-shaped couch designed by Studio65 in 1970. Originally conceived for a beauty salon in Milan, Bocca® is the perfect abstraction of sensuality and of the irreverent pop spirit of 1970s design: the project is the symbol of that radical research which Gufram, beginning with its founding 1966, carries on even today. At a historic moment in which design, like all artistic expressions, was seeking to break from bourgeois conformity, Gufram affirmed itself as a point of reference for a substantial group of international artists and creatives eager to experiment with shapes. The ability of the brand to work with polyurethane – an innovative material which was developed right during that period – transformed it into a real creative workshop, a place where everything was possible. 

Radical Design derives, on the one hand, from the need to deconstruct and reconstruct the home setting and its elements, bringing the revolution of use and of the shape of furnishings to the extreme; on the other hand it wants to integrate the values of Surrealism – the European artistic movement still active in the 1960s – into the production and industrial process – along with that of Pop Art, which had just arrived from the United States. It was precisely from Pop Art that the need to integrate the creative gesture with mass production, and artistic inspiration with the consumption of objects, arose: Gufram was among the first companies to sense the change and became the spokesman for it. Many of the projects from the 1960s and 1970s have become icons of that movement which Gufram continues to support today through the enhancement of its historic pieces and the production of new projects together with contemporary designers who are the torchbearers of those radical values.

Precisely for its disruptive and nonconformist aesthetic, the Bocca® couch has been selected by architects, designers, and creatives to give a radical touch to some of their most important projects around the world. In the lobby of the Sanderson Hotel in London, designed by Philippe Stark, Bocca® welcomes guests with its sensual elegance. In the Byblos Art Hotel Villa Amistà in Verona, architect Alessandro Mendini wanted its sinuous shapes to lend a touch which is outside of the norm. Fashion designer Martin Margiela, called to furnish the interiors of the Les Sources de Caudalie resort, chose Bocca® to underscore his minimal project with delicate tones. In addition to being a domestic sculpture with an unbeatable surprise effect, this couch with its unusual shape asserts itself as a striking piece to be used in interior design projects dedicated to public spaces. All of its components, in fact, comply with the directives on the furnishing of common spaces. For this reason, even the selection of fabrics – elastic for the classic Bocca® and natural wool with a vibrating effect for Bocca® Unlimited – confirms itself as an added value piece for all designers who dedicate themselves to contract.

The glamorous charm of the Bocca® couch has made it the perfect accessory for photo shoots and the protagonist of set design throughout the world. From the first photos in the ’70s with model and actress Marisa Berenson, to the ad shots of a famous cosmetics house featuring Heidi Klum, to the world tours of artists such as Beyonce and Katy Perry, the Bocca® couch has expressed its iconic and evocative power to the utmost, not only in the world of design but also in that of fashion and entertainment.  Bocca® has been the protagonist of editorials for some of the most important magazines in the world such as Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and Elle, portrayed together with actresses of the caliber of Anne Hathaway and Alicia Silverstone. Like a true artist, it has participated in memorable shows at the Crazy Horse in Paris and in cultural events such as the Opéra Pompidou performance of Francesco Vezzoli in the Paris museum of the same name.

Portrayed by the lens of famous photographers such Richard Avedon and David LaChapelle, Rankin, Bocca® is still a diva, the archetype of sensuality which, a half century after its creation, maintains its overwhelming vital energy unchanged.

Gufram on Archiproducts.com