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About the Item
‘Boby’ Art / Trolley Cart by Joe Colombo for B-Line,
Designed in 1970, Italy
“great color / six drawers”
“Part of the permanent collection of MoMA in New York and the Triennale in Milan, Smau Prize in 1971. Functionality and detail are its strong points which, together with an undeniably pop flavour, continue to make it the most popular storage trolley in creativity sectors as well as in the medical, and in the home. Designed with injection-moulded ABS plastic drawers and compartments that guarantee simple vertically modular solutions, ‘Boby’ provides versatile customized storage capacity, while its polypropylene casters guarantee full mobility.
“Joe Colombo was born in Milan in 1930. Essentially self-taught, he attended the Academy in Brera and then the faculty of Architecture at the Politecnico in Milan for a few years. Before becoming a designer he worked as a painter, builder, car salesman and entrepreneur in the electrics field. The technological utopia of Joe Colombos designs encompasses many of the hopes of the Sixties in Italy and Europe without becoming imprisoned by ideological restraints. He died prematurely on 30th July 1971 on his 41st birthday.”Creator: Joe Colombo (Designer),B-Line (Maker)Design: Boby TrolleyDimensions: Height: 29 in (73.66 cm)Width: 17 in (43.18 cm)Depth: 16.5 in (41.91 cm)Style: Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)Materials and Techniques: PlasticPlace of Origin: ItalyPeriod: 1970-1979Date of Manufacture: 1970Condition: GoodWear consistent with age and use.Seller Location: Philadelphia, PAReference Number: 1stDibs: LU843041588162Shop All Joe Colombo
Joe Colombo
He died tragically young, and his career as a designer lasted little more than 10 years. But through the 1960s, Joe Colombo proved himself one of the fields most provocative and original thinkers, and he produced a remarkably large array of innovative chairs, table lamps and other lighting and furniture as well as product designs. Even today, the creations of Joe Colombo have the power to surprise.
Cesare Joe Colombo was born in Milan, the son of an electrical-components manufacturer. He was a creative child he loved to build huge structures from Meccano pieces and in college he studied painting and sculpture before switching to architecture.
In the early 1950s, Colombo made and exhibited paintings and sculptures as part of an art movement that responded to the new Nuclear Age, and futuristic thinking would inform his entire career. He took up design not long after his father fell ill in 1958, and he and his brother, Gianni, were called upon to run the family company.
Colombo expanded the business to include the making of plastics a primary material in almost all his later designs. One of his first, made in collaboration with his brother, was the Acrilica table lamp (1962), composed of a wave-shaped piece of clear acrylic resin that diffused light cast by a bulb concealed in the lamps metal base. A year later, Colombo produced his best-known furniture design, the Elda armchair (1963): a modernist wingback chair with a womb-like plastic frame upholstered in thick leather pads.
Portability and adaptability were keynotes of many Colombo designs, made for a more mobile society in which people would take their living environments with them. One of his most striking pieces is the Tube chair (1969). It comprises four foam-padded plastic cylinders that fit inside one another. The components, which are held together by metal clips, can be configured in a variety of seating shapes (his Additional Living System seating is similarly versatile).
Vintage Tube chairs generally sell for about $9,000 in good condition; Elda chairs for about $7,000. A small Colombo design such as the plastic Boby trolley an office organizer on wheels, designed in 1970 is priced in the range of $700.
As Colombo intended, his designs are best suited to a modern decor. If your tastes run to sleek, glossy Space Age looks, the work of Joe Colombo offers you a myriad of choices.
Find vintage Joe Colombo lamps, seating and other furniture for sale on 1stDibs.
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