Davide Mercatali: basic forms, primary colours and ten years with Paolo Pedrizzetti

Ten years, two names on every drawing: from 1978 to 1988 Davide Mercatali worked with Paolo Pedrizzetti in an associated studio, and what came out of it is remembered for two things, basic forms and primary colours. His architecture degree, taken in Milan, dates from 1973; the city is also his birthplace, in 1948. When the decade closed he carried on alone, as designer and as promoter. The second role was not new: in 1984 he had been among those who founded ZEUS, where his task was to organise design exhibitions, and Metals, a brand promoting metal furniture for collective spaces, came in 1990. Taps remained his specialism, though he also drew sofas, lamps and fireplaces.

The partnership’s lasting result is I Balocchi, which Fantini describes as its first series of coloured taps: rounded shapes from the Seventies, reissued in 2012. A British bathroom that wants a red tap rather than one more chrome one has its reference there, and the question of which colour, and where, is settled between the architect and La Mercanti.