The jury met in early March, on the eve of the lockdown, in a moment of already evident emergency. “An atmosphere of metaphysical alarm” says Briatore, “which perhaps made us more sensitive to the idea of a cycle that begins and ends. We certainly did not want to reward another chair. But objects that contribute to the good of everyone, not just the design industry or designers”. The rest was done by the balance between different cultures. It is an idea of seriousness and methodical critical analysis. “Professionals from the extremes of the world. From north to south, from east to west, in an atmosphere of epochal alarm: an important Compasso d’Oro could only come from it”, concludes Briatore ironically.
An awaited and indisputable Compasso d'Oro is the one given to Francisco Gomez Paz for the Eutopia chair. A design and production experiment that gives an imprimatur to a different way of guiding the process, from design to finished product. Francisco Gomez Paz: “It is an award that deeply moved me. And in order to be present at the ceremony, I faced a daring journey, from Argentina to Italy”. Eutopia is an autarchic, revolutionary project. A very light chair in Kiri wood, structured on a cross joint assembled in ten pieces of solid wood. It is self-produced with industrial machines - laser cutting, numerical control cutter, 3D printer. “I wanted to show that it is possible to make design products even in remote places, where the situation that Vanni Pasca has well defined as metaphysics does not exist, which is the ideal humus for the development of industrial design" explains Francisco. “I'm not an anti-system person. Working alone on this project weighed heavily on me, I don't hide it. But I wanted to give a strong signal to my South American colleagues. Technology helps personal initiative and the realization of dreams and utopias. Like that of producing design in Argentina, really producing it”.