This article is taken from our supplement “The taste of M”, devoted to Japan, on sale on the world boutique.
If the television screen seems to desert the living room for the benefit of laptops and video projectors, radio stations are surfaced, often displaying a vintage look that highlights the nostalgic load of the object. Passionate Bordeaux (the deans) even take care of resuscitating old TSF transistors thanks to the magic of Bluetooth. In a very different style (and for a budget), hi-fi myths such as radiofonografo, Created by the Castiglioni brothers for Brionvega in 1965, always make design collectors dream.
This imposing radio and platinum and platinum, with removable speakers and mounted on casters, combines retrofuturistic lines and frank colors (white, hard blue, pop orange). The manufacture of this icon, now marketed in connected version, is entrusted to Italian craftsmen who make each piece unique.
Still on the Transalpine slope, Cassina reissues the in crystallo radio that Franco Albini made in 1940 for its personal use, dismantling a wooden post to encrust the electrical parts into tempered glass. An object of amazing modernity … For amateurs, some vintage resellers regularly post high -flying stereo equipment on Instagram. Basa (Basa_vintage), for example, offers beautiful samples, such as Radio Radio Commander Luxus de Rosita (1974) or the Stereo Tube Space Age console of Yonel Lebovici for Paam (1968).
Finally, Phaidon published, in October 2024, Hi-fi, a history of high-end audio design, A work signed Gideon Schwartz devoted to these technological wonders which transform musical equipment into a masterpiece of design.
Radiofonografo, wood and metal, design Achille and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni, Brionvega, € 16,000, Brionvega.com; Radio in crystallo, in tempered glass and lacquered MDF, Franco Albini design, Cassina, € 7,300, Cassina.com; “Hi-fi. A history of high-end audio design”, by Gideon Schwartz, Phaidon, 2024, 272 p., € 69.95.
