Sergio Cammilli, historical Italian entrepreneur in the field of design, was born in Agliana (PT) in 1920. He frequented The Institute of Art of Florence and was immediately interested in the sector of art and interior architecture. In 1956 he gave life to an innovative proposal which will have become Poltronova.
In 1957 the meeting took place with E. Sottsass jr., determining the history and evolution of the company, which saw among its collaborators many of the most important names in design. With the Poltronova production he organized shows in Italy and abroad. In 1986 he gave life to the Mirabili collection, which called upon the collaboration of well known architects and designers.
“Even though he has, in his time, created one of the most important Italian industrial enterprises for the production of furniture, Sergio Cammilli does not have either the character or the industrialist’s mentality. Knowing him, one has the impression that the many beautiful things that he created on designs of architects and artists, were done mostly to second a vocation of illuminated commitment for which he liked to recreate that relationship of creative synergy that bound him to the other artists in the great epochs of the history of culture.”
Paolo Portoghesi
“ With Cammilli we started formulating a certain idea of the furnishing, modern so to say, that was also acceptable for the people in general, acceptable as a metaphor of a new possible existence “.
Ettore Sottsass
“Sergio Cammilli is a kind of seismograph of design. I met him when the most subtle games between him and the protagonists of controdesign had already been made.All the famous pieces wanted by him had already oxygenated international design, leading it on through anthropological horizons of great magnitude”.
Alessandro Mendini