Alberto Meda
Alberto Meda (born 1945) is an Italian engineer and designer. His work is held in museums around the world. He lives in Milan.
Alberto Meda
- Born
- 1945 · Tremezzina.
- Nationality
- Italy
- Occupation
- designer · engineer
- Fields
- industrial design
- Education
- Polytechnic University of Milan
- Languages
- Italian
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Alberto Meda (born 1945) is an Italian engineer and designer. His work is held in museums around the world. He lives in Milan.
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Note VALÉORINE
Alberto Meda (born 1945) is an Italian designer and engineer. The designer was born in Tremezzina.
Alberto Meda studied at Polytechnic University of Milan. The designer worked for Cor Unum. Alberto Meda is active in industrial design.
Languages used include Italian. Works by the designer are held at Design Museum Den Bosch and Museum of Modern Art.
Composed from admitted, traceable facts · 26 September 2026
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In this article
Early life
Early life
Alberto Meda studied at Polytechnic University of Milan. The recorded working language is Italian. The field of work recorded is industrial design. Employment is recorded with Cor Unum. Work by Alberto Meda is recorded in the collections of Museum of Modern Art and Design Museum Den Bosch.
Meda was born in Tremezzina, in the Italian province of Como in 1945, and graduated with a laurea in mechanical engineering at the Politecnico di Milano in 1969.
Career
Career
In 1973 he became the technical director and head of planning at Kartell, in charge of furniture and plastic laboratory equipment projects.
Design
Design
In 1979 he worked as a freelance industrial designer for companies such as Alfa Romeo Auto, Alias, Alessi, Arabia-Finland, Cinelli, Colombo design, Brevetti Gaggia, JCDecaux, Ideal Standard, Luceplan, Legrand, Mandarina Duck, Omron Japan, Philips, Olivetti, and Vitra. • Illustration — Titania pendant light designed for Luceplan (with Paolo Rizzato), 1989 • Illustration — Lola lamp designed for Luceplan (with Paolo Rizzato), 1987 Meda came to design from engineering, bringing a pragmatic approach and attention to details in materials and production process. His applied science background shaped designs that are modern in form, and organic in feel. This sophistication caught the eye of Rolf Fehlbaum, chairman of Swiss manufacturer Vitra, who commissioned the engineer to design a chair. This collaboration resulted in seating pieces such as the MedaPro and the MedaPal.
Museums
Museums
Meda's designs are held in the permanent collection of museums such as the Museum of Modern Art of Toyama, the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Examples of these works include the "Light light " chair (1987), the "Soft light" chair (1989), the "Longframe" by Alias (1991), and the "On-Off" lamp by Luceplan (1988). In 2023 the Triennale di Milano staged a retrospective in of his work titled Alberto Meda: Tension and Lightness.
Teaching and research
From 1983 he was a lecturer on industrial technology at Domus Academy, which lasted until 1987. He conducted seminars at International Design Symposium in Fukui, at Workshop Design Quest in Osaka, and at Design Center in Tokyo. From 1995 he was a lecturer at Politecnico of Milan "Corso di Laurea di Disegno Industriale" with a design lab. From 1995 to 1997 he was a member of Board of Designlabor Bremerhaven. From 2003 to 2007 he lectured at IUAV in Venice with design workshops. In 2016, he became a member of the Scientific Committee of the Fondazione Politecnico di Milano. He gave lectures and seminars at Chicago, Washington University, in Stockholm, Miami, San Paulo, Taipei, Ulm, Istanbul, Toronto, Mexico, Hong Kong, Firenze, Oslo, Istanbul, Lausanne, and Seoul.
Awards
• Award — Year — Object — Company • Compasso d'oro — 1989 — Lola lamp — Luceplan • 1994 — "Metropoli" lamps — Luceplan • 2008 — MIX lamp — Luceplan • 2011 — Teak table — Alias • 2016 — Flap acoustic panel — Caimi Brevetti • 2018 — Origami screen-radiator — Tubes • 1990"Creativitalia" (Tokio1990) e una personale alla Design Gallery di Matzuia Ginza • 1992 XVIII Triennale, 'La leggerezza' sezione del 'Il Giardino delle cose' • 1992 "Design Plus" Titania lamp, Luceplan • 1993 "Mestieri d'autore" (Siena) • 1994 "European Design Prize", Luceplan • 1995 "Mutant materials in contemporary design" al MOMA-(New York) • 1995 "Industrie Forum design" Hannover UNI – X family lamps • 1996 "Meda-Rizzatto" alla Galerie Binnen (Amsterdam) • 1996 "Industrie Forum design" Hannover Titania Clamp lamp • 1997 Good design Gold Prize–Japan Meda chair, Vitra • 1998 I.D design review 'Best of category' Meda chair, Vitra • 1999 Designer of the year, personale al Salon du Meuble (Parigi) • 1999 Designer of the year, Salon du Meuble de Paris • 2000 Bundespreis Produktdesign, Meda chair, Vitra • 2001 "Italia e Giappone: design come stile di vita" (Yokohama, kobe) • 2001 Good Design Award Chicago Athenaeum Water Jug, Arabia • 2002 Reddot Award knives, Iittala Finland • 2005 "Hounorary Royal Designer for Industry" Londra RSA • 2006 "Design Plus" e "Light of the future" MIX lamp, Luceplan • 2007 "INDEX:award" Solar Bottle • 2008 Design and Elastic Mind- (MOMA) • 2012 Best of – Design Plus per OttoWatt, Luceplan • 2014 Triennale di Milano Il Design Italiano oltre le crisi • 2014 Best of Neocon (U.S.A) Silver Award Flap, Caimi Brevetti • 2015 Youthful – spazio Domus, (Milano) • 2015 The Bauhaus#itsalldesign. (Vitra Design Museum) • 2015 German Design Award Flap, Caimi Brevetti • 2016 DesignEuropa Awards (EUIPO) Flap, Caimi Brevetti • 2016 Good Design Award Chicago Athenaeum Origami, Tubes • 2017 Red Dot with Frame 52, Alias • 2018 Red Dot Best of the Best with Aledin lamp, Kartell
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.Spina, Ubaldo. Alberto Meda, tensione e leggerezza. Giornale dell'Architettura. 2023-11-15.
- 2.Fiell, Charlotte. Design of the 20th Century. Taschen. 458. 2005. 9783822840788.
- 3.Titania Hanging Lamp. www.mbam.qc.ca.
- 4.MedaPal by Alberto Meda for Vitra.
- 5.Alberto Meda Tension and Lightness. triennale.org.
- 6.Piotti, Cristina Kiran. Alberto Meda: design's master of lightness. Wallpaper* Magazine. 7 October 2023.
- 7.Katsikopoulou, Myrto. alberto meda's ongoing pursuit of lightness celebrated at triennale milano exhibition. designboom architecture & design magazine. 24 October 2023.
- 8.Current Honorary Royal Designers for Industry. The RSA.
References
Citations
References
Each reference names the institution holding it, so a reader may go to the document itself.
reference work
Secondary witnessreference work
Secondary witness
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 17 August 2026.
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