Sam Grawe

The museum's bathroom is kitted out with Castelli Ferrieri's 5021/64 Outline System, the 1978 modular wall organizer based on shaker pegs. Don't miss a word of Dwell! Download our FREE app from iTunes, friend us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter!

The Kartell museum is located in Noviglio, just outside Milan.

1950's K 101 Ski Rack by Carlo Barassi and Roberto Menghi, a rubberized set of straps that easily clipped onto a car roof (as opposed to the bulky and unwieldy roof racks then on the market), was the first Kartell product. It proved to be a great success.

Having produced an array of lab ware, in 1955 Kartell was among the first companies to introduce plastic products to the home environment. The KS 1067 dustpan by Gino Colombini was among their first.

The delicate looking KS 1475 carpet beater was made with polyethylene surrounding a metal core.

Gino Colombini's KS 1068 dustpan with handle came in an array of progressive colors enjoyed tremendous success upon its 1957 release. It has subsequently been added to museum collections the world over, including MoMA.

A young Milanese architect named Joe Colombo realized the 4801 armchair in 1964. An anomaly in the catalog, the chair is made entirely from wood without the use of screws or glue.

Initially developed for Fiat dealerships, Musée D'Orsay architect Gae Aulenti's 1974 collection, including the 4894 table and 4794 armchair seen here, were produced in a moulded rigid polyurethane that had a new texture and matte finish.

By the early 1960s the company's design aesthetic had become more refined, and in a way prefigured the space age look that was to become popular by the decade's end. Euginio Gentili Tedeschi's 4062 suspension lamp from 1962 is almost a yard in diameter, and would have been impossible to produce (for cost and technical reasons) in any other material than plastic.

Colombo's 4029 table lamp features indentations to house desktop items.

Functional, friendly and colorful—to the point of appearing almost cartoonish—a stack of nesting 4906/07 tables by Giotto Stoppino and a bright blue 4850 stacking chair by Giorgina Castiglioni, Giorgio Gaviraghi, and Aldo Lanza, give the spirit of the company's direction by the late 1960s.

Gerd Lange's space age 4064/65 suspension lamps prefigure today's popular FL/Y lamp by Kartell art director Ferruccio Laviani.

The 4545 "centipede" bed by Antonio Locatelli and Pietro Salmoiraghi from 1972 was one of company's least successful offerings and only remained in production for a year.

The intensely postmodern 4814 lounge chair with two wheels was among Anna Castelli Ferrieri's last designs for the brand.

ORANGE BOX by HANNU KÄHÖNEN Kähönen argues that in the big picture chairs are "inessential from an ecological point of view." With this in mind he aimed to create a seat that minimized the use of materials and energy to produce. The Orange box is made with simple tools from just two standard Finnish orange crates and a piece of string.

LASTUJA LOUNGE CHAIR by TAPIO ANTTILA Carpentry around the world produced huge amounts of chip waste that is usually destroyed by burning. Anttila suggests that were his recycled plastic chair to make it to production the chips could be sourced by the user, minimizing shipping costs and energy.

TUPA CHAIR by SIMO HEIKKILÄ The Tupa chair is manufactured in Fiskars, Finland from local materials—aspen wood—using local methods. The inspiration comes from using a common form of joinery from traditional home construction, albeit on a smaller scale. Just hope your cat doesn't mistake the seat for his litterbox.

V.31 by LUDI ARCHITECTS A playful chair shaped like a traditionally carved tree trunk is made from 100% wool felt. The architects feel that tremendous amounts of wood are wasted in production where was with felt nothing is lost.

RE-JACKET by PASI PÄNKÄLÄINEN Pänkäläinen's chair makes a statement about the globe's rising temperatures and the diminishing need for his heavy winter outerwear. Re-Jacket features a standard parka fitted to a power-coated bent aluminum frame.

BEDOUIN by ILKKA SUPPANEN Helsinki Design Week's Designer of the Year presents a collapsible lightweight chair that takes up very little room—minimizing both storage and transport costs. It was also constructed from entirely renewable materials.

2.5 KG CHAIR by BJÖRN DAHLSTRÖM Weighing in at, you guessed it, 2.5 kilograms Dahlström's chair weights about half of the industry average. He suggests that by stripping away at the mass of our objects we could achieve massive change—for 50,000 of these chairs 150 tons of processed wood could be saved.

ECHO by HEIKKI RUOHO Echo is made from a new recycled and recyclable corrugated cardboard. Ruoho used the exhibition as a launching point to show the results of his experiments with the material. Two pieces of the board slide and fold together, resulting in a chair that requires no glue (or any other material for that matter) to provide a comfortable seat. Too minimal? Simply customize with a sharpie.

FOLD. FOLD by TERHI TUOMINEN This elegantly facetted stacking chair is made from locally sourced alder wood joined by wood glue. Its finished using an organic oil that helps to prolong it life and promote a lifetime of use.

SAUNA BENCH by EERO AARNIO The master of space-age pop plastics takes a turn for the natural with this sauna bench made from Finnish fur. It's intended to be used outdoors and is treated with black Pinotex timber oil. Aarnio doesn't intend for the chair to be mass-produced, but rather treated as an artifact that can be passed down from generation to generation.

A copper variation of ceiling fixture A622 casts a soft glow in the atelier's portico. A larger version of this fixture was used in the administrative floors of the Finance Department.

This wall fixture above the main staircase was developed for the National Pensions Institute (completed in 1956). The fixtures for that project were largely fabricated by Valaisintyö company. Aalto worked with the workshop's owner Viljo Hirvonen until the desired results were achieved.

Above the coffee table in Aalto's home hangs one of his most well known designs, A331, the "Beehive." The home at 20 Riihitie is now a museum.

Another fixture developed for the National Pensions Institute found its way into Aalto's home to light the dining table. An oil painting by the architect hangs in the background.

A small sconce lights the entry.

This sconce lights the home's upper terrace. When it was completed in the summer of 1936 the house would have had extensive views of the nearby bay.

A623 is another of the prototypes hanging in Aalto's personal office.

One of the few lights in Aalto's home not designed by the architect is this folded paper lamp that graces the living room piano. It was given to Aalto by Danish designer Poul Henningsen during World War II. At the time Henningson was living in Sweden and didn't have access to his metalshop so he experimented in available materials like paper or cloth.

This light in an upstairs bedroom (A703) was originally developed in 1929. This is a later version sold through Artek.

Standard Light A809, a floor lamp in the living area, features three ringed cones.