'My father was born in 1892, the son of a factory worker and a peasant woman. I was born in 1950, the son of an industrialist and an office worker. By the age of 27, he had founded a metalworking company. At the same age, having abandoned my parka, my poorly digested years at Bocconi, and my legal studies — I dressed myself up, put on a tie and, without ever truly meaning to, set off as a bicycle entrepreneur.' This is how Antonio Colombo describes his family background, which was similar to many other family-run industrial companies, the backbone of Italian design culture.
Inside Antonio Colombo's design archive
From tubular steel chairs to record-breaking bicycles, the Colombo family embraced technology on many levels and told some of the most celebrated stories of Italian 20th century design.
Now, many of their achievements will be displayed in the newly opened archive situated within an industrial estate on the outskirts of Milan. The archive occupies a 500-square-metre space, in the very place where, in 1977, Colombo together with Fabrizio Giussani started his visions of modern bicycle industry.
The archive is a collection of stories of industrial culture, products, prototypes and personal events. Curated in collaboration with Melania Andronic, the archive gathers the Colombo family's passions over a century. 'I wanted to inform and to share a memory that has always knocked at my door—a door that sometimes I opened and sometimes I closed,' tells Antonio.
Antonio’s father started his company AL Colombo (Angelo Luigi) in 1919 with the desire of making steel tubing for general applications. At the same time, it was the main supplier to Italian aeronautical companies such as Caproni, Piaggio and Macchi, and supported the Italian Air Force’s achievements in this field. During the 1930s, he created Columbus Mobili Razionalisti to work on special projects including tubular-steel furniture. He collaborated with Marcel Breuer and other Italian modernist designers including Piero Bottoni, Luigi Figini and Gino Pollini, Giuseppe Pagano and Giuseppe Terragni.
'He had become Italy’s most important and sophisticated manufacturer of tubular furniture, with an in-house carpentry workshop, upholstery department and chrome-plating facilities, producing furniture for universities and aircraft interiors,' says Antonio.
In the post-war period, A. L. Colombo also became a leading name in the motoring sector (Ferrari, Piaggio and Moto Guzzi), specializing in the manufacture of high-alloy steel mechanical tubes. When Antonio Colombo took part of the family company, the brand Columbus was going to disappear.
'I asked my father if I could make a spin off of bicycle tubing department and he said yes,' remembers Antonio who founded the cycling tubes brand in 1976 and started another legend of Italian creative industry. With less than 10 people, the company quickly became a leader in bike frames production. 'My farther was friends with Cino Cinelli, of the renowned Cinelli cycling company. When Cino retired, he offered the company to me and I bought it in 1977. That's when the adventure started, describes Antonio, who then devoted his life to bicycles and everything revolving around them.
Cinelli and Columbus dominated bicycle culture for a few decades. Colombo opened shops designed by Franco Raggi, and collaborated with avant-garde designers and artists such as Alessandro Guerriero, Alessandro Mendini and even Keith Haring. 'Art and design entered a place they had never entered before: the world of the bicycle, which at the time was decidedly old-fashioned,' says Antonio, who completely changed the way bicycle producers can collaborate with artists and designers.
In the 1980s, both Cinelli and Columbus were at their peak. Together with engineer Paolo Erzegovesi, Cinelli created the first European mountain bike, the Rampichino, and legendary aerodynamic track bicycle Laser, which won a Compasso d'Oro in 1991.
Following the success of his companies, Colombo founded his own art gallery with Aloisia Resch, completing his cultural world based on industry, design and art. But it was not the end for Colombo. Many years before he sold his companies to American investors in 2021, Cinelli made its progress again and became a cult company embracing new movement of bike fixed-gear culture and street art followed by other commercial companies much later.
'Our archive is not intended to be either a museum or a visitor centre open to the general public, but rather a place of study and research for scholars and enthusiasts by appointment – at least for the time being. We will be devoting a great deal of effort to expanding the website, where many aspects will be further developed,' says Colombo about the archive comprising tens of thousands of documents, photographs, prototypes, objects, catalogues and testimonies, uncovering creative history where industry, design and art create dynamic culture.