Already have something in mind?
Trade terms for professionals and design studios
Look closely at the top and you will find them: a set of concentric circles pressed into the leather, like the rings a pebble leaves on still water. They are not ornament. The wireless charger lives under the surface at exactly that point, so the phone goes down on the circles and charges with nothing trailing across the desk. On modern leather desks a technical function rarely announces itself so quietly: a mark in the material tells you where, and that is all it says.
The rest of the desk is built with the same economy. Top and sides are one piece of beech plywood bent in a mould and then covered in leather, so the surface runs down to the floor without a corner. The modesty panel facing a visitor is veneered in Canaletto walnut, and the leather of the top divides precisely above its partitions. A hinged hatch in the leather opens onto a power socket and USB ports, one of them USB-C, for the laptop and the lamp. At 171 × 80 cm (67⅜ × 31½ in) it suits a study at home, and the finish holds its own beside luxury executive desks.
Design Lorenzo De Grandis, 2022; made by i4Mariani, Mariano Comense. The family is short: one desk, with one or two drawers at the sides, each with a curved walnut front and a graphite-stained ash interior that takes A4 sheets. La Mercanti sits down with the client to decide where the phone and the lamp will live before the desk finds its place.
Tell us which finishes you'd like to assess
A single panel of beech plywood bent in a mould. i4Mariani shapes it so that top and sides form one continuous curve, then covers it in leather. Where a conventional desk would have a corner there is a bend, and leather is the surface you touch everywhere: on the top, on the flanks and down to the floor. For an architect it means the desk reads as one object from every side of the room.
i4Mariani designed it for the home office, and the catalogue adds that the desk can reach more generous proportions to take its full place in the working office. The catalogue size today is 171 × 80 cm (67⅜ × 31½ in). In practice it suits a private study, a partner's room in a practice or a compact office where the client wants a desk with character rather than a workstation.
The front of each drawer is curved to follow the leather of the top, so the drawer becomes part of the outline rather than a box added at the side. It is veneered in Canaletto walnut, the same wood as the modesty panel, while the inside is graphite-stained ash. Closed, the drawer joins the walnut of the front; open, it shows a dark interior against which paper and pens are easy to find.
i4Mariani lists three leather collections for Nami: Harmonie, Vegetale (with Nevada, Dakota and Holiday) and Privilege. Across its whole range the 2023 catalogue counts 60 types of leather. The choice also shapes the joins: depending on the category, the size of each cut varies considerably, so the seams can fall in slightly different places. A physical sample is the honest way to decide.
In Mariano Comense, in the province of Como, where i4Mariani has worked since 1957. The desk was designed in 2022 by Lorenzo De Grandis, whose studio also art-directed the 2023 i4Mariani catalogue and who created Abstract Leather, a series of hand-made artworks in relief leather. The pairing explains the piece: a designer who treats leather as a sculptural material, and a company that offers sixty types of it.
Nami comes in a single size and a single curve, so where it stands matters more than how it is configured. Five steps to fit it into a study or a private office.
Nami measures 171 × 80 cm (67⅜ × 31½ in) and stands 75 cm (29½ in) high. Draw that rectangle on the floor plan, or tape it on the floor, before anything else: this is the one catalogue size, so the room has to suit the desk and not the other way round.
The top runs down into the sides in one bend. i4Mariani describes it as a counterpoint to the more rigorous forms of an interior, so it works best where the room offers them: a wall of shelving, a long window, a straight run of panelling.
The hatch in the leather top holds a power socket and USB ports, including a USB-C. Placing the desk so that the wall outlet is on the same side keeps the supply lead short and out of sight from the visitor's chair, which is worth checking before the electrician leaves.
The drawers are separate units at the sides of the desk, each 42.5 × 67.5 cm (16¾ × 26⅝ in). Allow floor space on the flank where a drawer sits so it can be pulled fully open, and decide at order stage whether you need one or two, and on which side.
i4Mariani photographs the desk before a broad pane of glass over a garden, daylight falling across the top. If the room allows it, turn the desk towards natural light: wood and leather then show the bend at its best.
