Ettore Sottsass designed a series of cupboards (1966). Sottsass was a young designer, who was then at the start of his career. These cupboards are made of plywood. They’re paradoxical: they look like strange, inscrutable monoliths, like obelisks, but they’re covered with deliberately tacky plastic laminates. The decorative surface seems to undermine the stern form. This challenges the pomposity of Modernist design.
