Mid-Century P40 Lounge Chair attributed to Osvaldo Borsani for Tecno, Italy

This chair still has it’s beautiful and original black faux leather. The P40 chair can be adjusted to many different positions. The seat, back, footrest and headrest can all be adjusted separate from each other. In very good condition with some signs of age and use.
Designer: Osvaldo Borsani
Manufacturer: TECNO
Country: Italy
Model: P40 with adjustable headrest which not all chairs have
Design period: 1950’s
Date of manufacturing: 1950-70’s
Size WDH in cm: 72x90x90 seat height 38 cm.
The chair is adjustable many to different positions.
Material: Brass / Black lacquered metal / Original faux leather
Condition: Very good. Some signs of age and use. The brass has been polished.
About the P40 chair: Strong in its aesthetics and welcoming in its shapes, it conceals in its essential and elegant lines a unique mechanism that opens up to a whole series of adjustable positions up to full closure. Versatile, functional and with a strong personality, it is a fast, essential armchair with irresistible comfort, and its curves characterising an iconic design. P40 is the original relax armchair with moving elements, composed of a metal pedestal that supports the seat and backrest pivoted to allow all the intermediate inclinations between opening and complete folding. The legrest is concealed under the seat including a metal footrest, both retractable, while the headrest is extendable and the steel and rubber armrests are flexible to facilitate sitting.

About Osvaldo Borsani: Osvaldo founded Tecno together with his brother Fulgenzio. Osvaldo Borsani (Varedo 1911- Milano 1985) began work at an early age in the family business of making furniture. In 1933 he participated in the fifth Triennale of Milan with the design for the “ Minimal House”, which was awarded the silver medal. In the post-war period, after graduation from Polytechnic, he formed friendships with numerous artists like Lucio Fontana, Agenore Fabbri, Aligi Sassu, Roberto Crippa, Fausto Melotti, and Arnaldo Pomodoro, together with whom he realized important works of art in furnishing and interior architecture. In 1953, along with his brother Fulgenzio, he founded Tecno, the great project for which he worked his whole life in order to develop standard production with reference to that of design. His first industrial designs were the P40 adjustable armchair (1953) and the D70 reversible seat sofa. In 1968 it was the office system Graphis (together with Eugenio Gerli and coming into vogue around the world in a million copies) thanks to which Tecno became a world-leading manufacturer in design for the office. At the end of the Sixties, Osvaldo Borsani, together with Marco Fantoni and Valeria Borsani, created the Tecno Designs Centre, which creates new products and secures for the company the supervision of large interior architectural works, the experimentation in new technologies, and the strategies and the tools of business communication. At the same time Borsani opened up the design to collective uses and to the contribution of external designers.