In an increasingly design-conscious age, this series provides succinct and elegant introductions to the work of a varied roster of leading 20th century designers, graphic designers and architect/designers. This series examines critically and readably the visual forms and visual values that constitute the landmarks on our cultural map of the last 100 years. This book looks at the work of Ettore Sottsass who encapsulates the glamourous Italian achievement in design since World War II. Trained as an architect, he became famous as Olivetti's house designer, creating their legendary typewriter in the 1950s, and composing a comprehensive, indivisible office design strategy that brought us the co-ordinated office look so pervasive today. In 1980, he gave up orthodox modern corporate design to launch the avant-garde Memphis group, whose post-modernist fantasy furniture in primary colours and harsh shapes acquired worldwide notoriety. In this book, Jan Burney traces the paradoxical career of a man nurtured by Italian business' reverence for design who rejected the system that forged him, in order to make utopian, impractical design reality.