When Business Makes Culture

LA RINASCENTE

A CREATIVE LABORATORY

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Since its founding, the department store La Rinascente (Gabriele D’Annunzio invented this name in 1917) has been an extraordinary creative laboratory whose offerings in the way of architecture, art and design in all its forms (advertising, displays, products, packaging, etcetera) were a beacon that led modernity into the spotlight of everyday life. In the beginning, advertising was entrusted to Marcello Dudovich, whose input was fundamental. Soon, others became part of the constellation of talents working on popular communication: Luciano Mauzan, Aldo Mazza, Giovanni Manca, Mario Bazzi and Walter Resentera. Their posters tell the story of the company’s successes and hardships, starting with the inauguration of the rebuilt store on Piazza del Duomo in Milan after a terrible fire had burned it down in 1918. Alternately, the ads announce the opening of new departments (including an appealing promotion of autarchic fabrics in the years between the two wars), the felicity of shopping, and the hard-working spirit of reconstruction after World War II. In 1950, the Milan premises of La Rinascente were erected as we know them now, built to a design by the architect Ferdinando Reggiori, with the display windows and interiors by Carlo Pagani. All was branded with the famous l