Gabriella Crespi

In the year that Italian designer Gabriella Crespi would have turned 100, and 50 years after its initial conception, GUBI is putting the Bohemian 72 Collection into production for the first time. The collection is the beginning of a new collaboration with Archivio Gabriella Crespi and reflects the harmony between Crespi's artistic, bohemian vision and her love of travel and GUBI's confident curations and global outlook.

Born in 1922, Italian artist and designer Gabriella Crespi would have turned 100 this year. Throughout her extraordinary career in the design world, she moved effortlessly among both European royalty and the Hollywood jet set. Her indisputable glamour and sophisticated sense of style made her a muse to the fashion designer Valentino, and brought the likes of Audrey Hepburn, Gianni Versace, and Hubert de Givenchy into her social circle.

To honor this inspiring and extraordinary woman, GUBI is proud to introduce the Bohemian 72 Collection. Elegant, flexible, and refined, this collection is the distillation of Crespi's vision of a versatile rattan furniture family for what she called her house of the sun'. The pinnacle of the jet-set bohemian lounge lifestyle, Bohemian 72 brings together Crespi's interest in natural materials, her fascination with stacked sculptural forms, and her curiosity about Eastern cultures and philosophies, honed over years of travel.

During her lifetime, these exclusive pieces were only ever produced for private clients, but today, 50 years after they were first conceived, GUBI has worked from Crespi's original drawings to bring an extraordinary collection into production for the first time. In these iconic rattan furniture designs, a worldly Milanese sophistication is conjured from one of nature's most humble-seeming materials.

Crespi designed the Bohemian 72 Collection in the spring of 1972 from the terrace of her home in Milan. Alongside the renowned Rising Sun' and Five Positions' Collections, Bohemian 72 was part of Crespi's wider Bamboo Collection', designed between 1972 and 1975. Comprising a lounge chair, three-seater sofa, ottoman and floor lamp, the collection is the culmination of Crespi's career-long mission to create furniture that seamlessly unites indoor and outdoor living.

Crespi designed the Bohemian 72 Collection in the spring of 1972 from the terrace of her home in Milan. Alongside the renowned Rising Sun' and Five Positions' Collections, Bohemian 72 was part of Crespi's wider Bamboo Collection', designed between 1972 and 1975. Comprising a lounge chair, three-seater sofa, ottoman and floor lamp, the collection is the culmination of Crespi's career-long mission to create furniture that seamlessly unites indoor and outdoor living.

Drawn to rattan for its strength and versatility, she conceived these pieces at a time when the material was very much in vogue within the high-society circles in which she moved, viewed as the height of interior sophistication. Her decision to use repeating layers of vertically coiled rattan vines, however, was unusual for the time, and results in a distinctive and highly luxurious take on lounge furniture that has proven truly timeless.