History

2024 has been a crucial year for Visionnaire, marked by numerous awards and prestigious collaborations. The Zahara low cabinet won the Wallpaper Design Award, solidifying our position of excellence in the international design scene. 

We launched the new "Nomad" collection at the Salone del Mobile in Milan, celebrating the beauty of everyday living within an organic and enveloping architectural framework, along with the related advertising campaign featuring our new Global Brand Ambassador, Salma Abu Deif.

During Fuorisalone, we presented the project "Narrazioni Intrecciate" (Interwoven Narratives), created in collaboration with Draga & Aurel, where the paintings of Aurel K. Basedow came to life through the jacquard fabrics of the limited edition Aries chairs, of which only 8 pieces were made

A strategic highlight of the year was the acquisition of a majority stake in IPE Srl by Forel and Faro Alternative Investments SICAV, opening new growth prospects for the brand. 

Our international presence was strengthened through standout design events, such as the Salone del Mobile at Bloomingdale’s New York, Glue Amsterdam, and Homo Faber in Venice.

The new monobrand store openings in Baku and Vienna, along with the renovation of showrooms in Hong Kong, Milan, and London, demonstrate our commitment to bringing our craftsmanship and vision of contemporary luxury to the world.

The new 2023 season for Visionnaire – is not just a collection, but a unique and all-around project of architecture and interior design.

Volare is the new residential concept, created to narrate a true philosophy of living and a sartorial approach to the production of one-of-a-kind objects. The project aims to enhance the Genius Loci - the soul of the place - through the use of natural materials and colors that dialogue with the palette of the land and respond to the climatic conditions of the place.

The concept we present in the collection during the Salone del Mobile 2023 is the same one we have applied to the Volare project in Dubai. Our stand is the starting point of this villa, and it is its extraordinary feature. A new collection is a design manifesto of the contemporary home, which is in the Visionnaire’s interpretation is a  place of happiness, a theater of everyday beauty, a sanctuary for our personal rituals. 

During the Fuorisalone, we introduce L’Impero dei sensi - immersive installation in the Wunderkammer of the Visionnaire Design Gallery, dedicated to the senses as tools of knowledge of the world.  A synesthetic narrative, based on a vision of Studiopepe - Arianna Lelli Mami and Chiara Di Pinto - to describe a capsule collection of three pieces designed for Visionnaire: the Shibari chair, the Parade lighting system and the Blanche set of two mirrors.

The streak of international recognition continues in 2023: Leonardo bookshelf, designed by Alessandro La Spada, is a winner of 2023 Wallpaper* Design Awards in the Best Sleeper Hits category.

2022 is a year of double 60th anniversary– that of the Salone del Mobile and that of the company’s constant participation in the Italian fair. Visionnaire has in fact taken part in every iteration of the Salone del Mobile in Milan since 1961, contributing to its historic success and internationalization. 

Visionnaire presents the Mythica collection during the Salone Del Mobile Milano in June. The brand’s pavilion is a house-sanctuary, narrated through six thematic chapters: the Winter Garden, Atrium, Convivium, Day-time Oasis, Alcova and the Boudoir, symbolic places that prompt intense emotions and associative memories through the experience of living.

April 2022 is also marked by the launch of Apollo Belvedere - the first VISIONNAIRE NFT project, which explores innovative art and design languages in the era of Web3. The synergy between the Visionnaire’s expertise and the artist Jonathan Monaghan’s aesthetics has created a strong bond between craftsmanship traditions and the digital age. Imagination is the key element in Visionnaire’s act of transformation of precious materials into products for unique environments. This project expresses the brand’s ongoing relationship and dialogue with the Avant-garde. Apollo Belvedere is both a marble sculpture and animation, uniquely bound together with NFT+ technology. The work is exhibited at Visionnaire’s Miami Embassy from November 28th to December 4th, 2022.

Furthermore, the new Visionnaire Bistrot, a project of love and appreciation of Italian culinary culture by Chef Filippo Gozzoli, opened its doors. Bistro brings out the best in the finest local ingredients, applying experimental curiosity to new flavors and combinations for a sophisticated international audience looking for a unique immersive experience in a destination full of suggestions between art and design. 

Last but not least, 2022 is a year of international recognition: Apple floor lamp designed by m2atelier won the 2022 Wallpaper* Design Awards, "Best Rock Stars" category; Visionnaire's project Darsena del Sale was selected as the 2022 Architizer A+Awards Popular Choice Winner in the Architecture +Water category; Aries by Draga & Aurel and Cà Foscari by Alessandro La Spada are the winners of the 2022 Archiproducts Design Awards; Alya armchair, designed by Steve Leung, has been acknowledged as Honoree in the Product Design – Residential Seating Category of 2022 Best of Year Awards by Interior Design magazine.

Benefit company from 2021, Visionnaire defines its business as a promoter of positive value for the community and intends to pursue, in the exercise of economic activity, one or more positive effects - or reduce negative effects - towards people, communities, territories and environment.

This year Visionnaire has inaugurated two new strategic flagship stores, located in London and Dubai, confirming and celebrating its presence with direct stores all over the world. 

On December Visionnaire launch the Beauty Tales campaign, under the artistic direction of Eleonore Cavalli. Beauty Tales is not just a tale with a fifteenth-century atmosphere, but a reinterpretation of contemporary living, through a delicate photographic research that instills wonder.

During Milan Design Week of September, Visionnaire unveil a striking installation in its showroom named Insulae designed by Marco Bonelli and Marijana Radovic – aka m2atelier. Each island hosts a family of products from the Caprice collection designed by m2atelier. The main floor of the gallery also hosts products from the Babylon Rack collection designed by Alessandro La Spada, which are harmoniously integrated in the Insulae project.

Also, on the occasion of the Design Week, Visionnaire participates to Alcova, the traveling Kermesse of the Fuorisalone conceived by Joseph Grima and Valentina Ciuffi in 2018 and dedicated to designers, artists, galleries and institutions united by a pioneering vision of the culture of design, innovation and experimentation. Ideal stage for the installation “De Rerum Natura” by Gunilla Zamboni, known as Gupica.

Finally, 2021 is an year of international design awards for the brand: Admeto low table designed by Marco Piva winner of 2021 Wallpaper* Design Awards, Best Curves category; Imagine armchair designed by Mauro Lipparini results winner of the International Design & Architecture Awards Design Et Al, seating category. Lego low table and console designed by Draga&Aurel for have been selected for the ADI Design Index 2021; Basket Armchair designed by m2atelier winner of 2021 Archiproducts Design Awards, Outdoor category.

2020 is the year of the Beauty Collection, Beauty is a word with an intense, multifaceted meaning. Besides indicating an outlook of positive energy and hope, the contemporary beauty narrated by Visionnaire sums up an attitude, that of creating extraordinary, unique projects and objects. Constant technological research, experimentation with materials, the juxtaposition and mixing of element, the hands of our craftsmen that test, perfect and define a new material solution: these are the factors that go into every single product, making it unique, inimitable, yet reproducible.

In 2020, Visionnaire expands its Art Design offerings, approaching the great challenge of contextualizing them in a retail scenario and involving designers of artistic talent, with a vivid focus on experimentation with materials: almost “Renaissance” attitude, in terms of method and individual effort invested in the genesis and realization of the Brand’s creations.

The new Beauty collection is presented in June through a new digital format, the Visionnaire Live Shows. 

Also 2020 is an year of international design awards for the brand: Camden Armchair, designed by Mauro Lipparini results Jury Winner in the 8th annual Architizer A+Awards "residential seating" category and Il Pavone designed by Marc Ange has conquered the jury for its concept and design and results Winner of the 2020 Archiproducts Design Awards! 

Among the 2020 news, 3 new Collectable Books: Dreams, Beauty and Dehoor.

Mercury, the armchair and sofa model designed by sculptor Rito Valla in 1961 for IPE reissues by Visionnaire and available on 1stDibs!

The sequence of honors and awards continues: the Marty console designed by Marco Piva is honored in the “Best Dream Factory” category of the Wallpaper Design Awards. Thanks to an extraordinary policy of international growth, in 2019 the company has 31 exclusive stores around the world, and operates in 55 countries.

2019 is a year of anniversaries for IPE-Visionnaire: the mother company IPE celebrates the 60th anniversary of its founding, while Visionnaire, its exclusive brand, reaches its 15th year of success.

For the 58th edition of the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan and the associated FuoriSalone 2019, these milestones will be commemorated with a sequence of extraordinary initiatives.They include the launch of a signature volume, which takes on particular strategic and programmatic value: Decalogue – this is the title of the project – is a precious book published in a limited edition, presenting the ten fundamental and indispensable values of the company, defined through an overall vision that has the force of a credo. The texts offer a narrative of the historical roots of the brand, taking stock of its present identity and outlining ambitious trajectories for its future.

In late 2019 Visionnaire presents The “Il Pavone” collection by Marc Ange, which made its debut in the new flaghship store of Miami during Art Basel, in the “haute couture throne” and “prêt-à-porter chair”. 

This is the year of international prizes. As many as six awards of the international design community are assigned to Visionnaire: the Kobol bathroom console designed by Alessandro La Spada wins the Archiproducts Design Award; the Opera dining table, also by the designer Alessandro La Spada, takes the AD USA Great Design Award 2018; the Tanya chairs by Roberto Lazzeroni receives the Architizer A+ Design Award; the Tea Party table is a winner in the Wallpaper Design Awards, both in UK and in China; and the Balin, Elmo, Galdor and Tareg mirrors by Armando Bruno receive the NYCxDesign Award.

Visionnaire continues its path of stylistic evolution, with the aim of extending its offerings to more sophisticated and complex markets, such as those of Europe and North America, as well as a new generation of clients. For the company, this is the moment to present a collection composed of furnishings that reflect the linguistic canons of “Art Design,” and to introduce – as one of the first companies in the sector – a complete “Greenery” range of materials with low environmental impact. 

On display in the famous Harrods windows till May 10, 2017 Sandrino the Butcher is the first Art-Design project by Visionnaire, conceived by the designer Alessandro La Spada. The installation is involved in the Art Partners initiative by Harrods, aimed at celebrating the excellence of contemporary design, by fostering the cooperation between luxury brands and renowned creatives. 

A second investment fund enters the array of stakeholders, Ergon Capital II: the ownership thus includes two funds, as well as the Cavalli family and a number of private partners. During the same year, the first Visionnaire monobrand store in the Middle East is opened in Dubai, along with the first in the United States, in Miami. To celebrate the tenth anniversary of the founding of the brand, the Nature Jewel Box capsule collection is introduced, featuring exclusive products that stand out for the use of precious materials and light forms: this very successful collection marks the beginning of a new phase in the Visionnaire story.

The company ownership, previously limited to the Cavalli family, expands to include the Altopartners fund. This important step brings new energy to the entrepreneurial logic of international growth already in progress, and leads to the opening of the first Russian Visionnaire store, in Moscow.

The Visionnaire flagship store in Milan opens its doors, welcoming visitors into an elegant building on Piazza Cavour. The striking space with its vivid identity has an area of 2000 square meters, organized on two levels inside what was previously the historic “Cinema Cavour.” The location fully conveys the potential of the brand’s project, including a restaurant area and a space for cultural programming – the Wunderkammer gallery – set aside for art exhibitions. Visionnaire has always been inspired by the world of art in all its expressions, from cinema to music, from dance to painting. Fine art has become a natural extension of the design project. The gallery is as a real "room of wonders" and it plunges one’s conceptual roots in the Baroque period, when the nobles exhibited and boasted their travel memorabilia to amaze guests in these private environments.

Leopoldo Cavalli met Samuele Mazza for the first time in 2003, inside his Milanese boutique of Art Design and Art De La Table called “Visionnaire", which, at the time, was in front of the Besana monument in Viale Regina Margherita. Samuele Mazza, together with Luigi, Leopoldo and Eleonore Cavalli, with the collaboration of the designer Alessandro la Spada, decided, the following year, to give life and bring to the international market the new and revolutionary luxury design collection called Visionnaire, of which Samuele maintained the art direction until 2009, then definitively transferring the brand to the Cavalli family.

IPE introduces the Streamlined collection, a new proposal designed by Roberto Lazzeroni, which beyond individual projects involves the definition of original and unprecedented decor compositions for various areas of the home: in keeping with this principle, the bedroom zone, the dining room and the living area are radically reinterpreted and reorganized in the design. This new project paradigm is accompanied by remarkable changes in production praxis. The logic of in-house workmanship is put aside, leading to a substantial, visionary innovation: the production line is structured on the model of the distributed factory – split into segments that in any case remain interconnected – creating a system of highly qualified centers of expertise and excellence across the production districts of the Italian peninsula.

IPE takes part in the first edition of the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan with the Mercury armchair, designed by the sculptor Rito Valla: art and design find a new, completely original formula of interaction in this unique proposal. From this year on, the company has participated consecutively in all the editions of the Salone del Mobile in Milan until today.

At Zola Predosa (Bologna), the historic Italian company IPE was found by the brothers Carlo, Pompeo and Vittorio Cavalli. Their entrepreneurial adventure in the world of furnishings, specializing in the creation of upholstered pieces made with expanded polyurethane, takes on the character of a revolution of engineering and style, standing apart from the production processes of the time.