50 YEARS OF BEING A CACTUS®

Gufram celebrates the 50th anniversary of its most prickly icon

February 22, 2022

Milan, February 23, 2022 - Soft, thornless, but nonetheless prickly, and almost as tall as a person, CACTUS®, designed in 1972 by Guido Drocco and Franco Mello for Gufram, has been the subject of uncomfortable, free and often equivocal interpretations. Made in flexible polyurethane, this four-armed hall tree perfectly represents the grit, imagination and humour of the 1970s, while still remaining one of the most recognizable and contemporary designs to this date. 

Celebrating its 50 year anniversary, CACTUS® has completely revolutionised the domestic landscape. One of the most famous examples of Radical Design, it has been celebrated by various generations of artists, designers, fashion designers and creatives, and it has been the star of exhibitions in some of the most important museums worldwide, such as the Triennale in Milan, the National Art Museum in Beijing, and the Barbican in London. ​ 

Still produced with the original 1972 mould and entirely finished by hand, each piece is unique. The 2,165 bosses (give or take a few) that characterise the surface are finished by specialised artisans and then painted with Guflac®, Gufram’s unique patented paint that makes the polyurethane look like leather, while still allowing it to remain flexible and soft.

Green, white, red, blue, and even multicolour, over the years CACTUS® has been produced in many limited and numbered editions, some of which have sold out in just a few days. To celebrate the piece’s 50 year anniversary, Gufram will soon be announcing its collaboration with an out-of-the-box pop artist for the creation of a new edition of CACTUS®.

 

EDITIONS:

1972 CACTUS, 1/2000

2007 BIANCOCACTUS, 1/250 

2010 ROSSOCACTUS, 1/500 

2010 NEROCACTUS, 1/500 

2012 METACACTUS, 1/300

2013 GOD, 1/100 in collaboration with Toiletpaper

2015 LEBLEUCACTUS, 1/ 33 

2016 PSYCHEDELIC CACTUS, 1/169 in collaboration with Paul Smith 

2017 RADIANT CACTUS, 1/44 in collaboration with Ordovas Gallery

2018 ANOTHER WHITE CACTUS

2018 ANOTHER GREEN CACTUS

 

 

 

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About Gufram

Founded in Turin in 1966 and now part of Sandra and Charley Vezza’s Italian Radical Design group, Gufram was originally born as an artisanal entity and is now globally known for pushing the limits of industrial design. 

With its Radical Design spirit and its nonconformist experimentation linked to aesthetics, and technological and material research, over the years Gufram has created playful, subversive and desecrating pieces. Design icons that have become unique in form and value because of the cross-contamination between industrial design, artisanal creation, and imaginative flair, typical of art.

The brand’s research commitment has driven the company to master the treatment of flexible polyurethane and to the development of Guflac®, a special finish patented by Gufram to have more uniform, cohesive and elastic surfaces through accurate and meticulous craftsmanship processes.

Gufram’s unmistakable furniture items, such as the BOCCA® lips sofa, the PRATONE® chaise lounge and the CACTUS® hall tree, also known as domestic sculptures, represent an interpretation of the contact point between art and design, and are now displayed in some of the most beautiful houses and most renown museums worldwide.

Contact

Località Batasiolo 85/A 12064 La Morra - CN Italy

[email protected]

www.gufram.it