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Finds from the LA Modernism Show

lamodernism fenice coffee tea service sabattini

Tags:: Design; Culture

The 22nd annual Los Angeles Modernism Show, held May 1–3 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, featured more than 70 exhibitors with mid-century wares trucked in from all over the country. Sponsored in part by the peripatetic über-site 1stdibs.com, the show was mostly hits and a scant few misses, and vendors looked beyond their choice Le Corbusier and Eames gems to bring spectators something a little more unexpected. Check out some of our favorite pieces from the showroom floor, culled by writer Erika Heet.

Lino Sabattini Coffee and Tea Service
In the 1950s, Gio Ponti championed the designs of Lino Sabattini, a self-taught designer of cutlery and tableware, born in Italy in 1925. After Ponti placed his designs in the magazine Domus in 1956, Sabattini joined Christofle as design director, a post he held until 1963, in which he produced abstract modern metalware. He remained prolific through the 1990s, when he created the four-piece Fenice coffee and tea service consisting of a silver-plated coffee pot, teapot, sugar bowl, and creamer in a form that still hints of the atomic era. $19,500 from Dragonette