The eldest grandson of Franco Grignani. Running a multi-platform research project dedicated to preserving and digitising his legacy. (all under CC BY-NC 4.0)
Italy
Joined January 2022
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Past meets future. Left: the 1963 Woolmark judging panel in London, from a grainy vintage magazine. Right: my restoration after dozens of hours of manual work & multi-platform AI. We can spot Franco Grignani and Sir Gordon Russell. Do you recognize anyone else?
1963: Grignani’s Woolmark saved authenticity from synthetics.
60+ years later, the EU AI Act moves the battle from fibres to pixels.
AI labelling is now mandatory, but we still lack a global icon.
Will we ever find a "Grignani" for the AI era?
I truly had fun creating this.
Step inside my Metasteps space dedicated to the complete Franco Grignani × Alfieri & Lacroix ad series — now captured in this walkthrough video.
A journey through 20th-century graphic innovation:
youtu.be/BXLtsK57F6w
How did Franco Grignani construct his “hyperbolic” structures — without computers?
A new A.I. driven video explores in English the rigorous geometric method behind these works.
youtu.be/FW3CA3OoBmc
Some books shouldn’t disappear into storage...
I’m placing part of Franco Grignani’s reference library—original vintage design magazines—back into circulation.
Each sale supports research and archival work on his legacy.
ebay.it/usr/emiliano.camera
Franco Grignani (1908–1999) would have turned another year today.
This year, my 'gift' is a selection of international magazine clippings that were written about his work between 1953 and 1995 — all freely browsable online, as in my spirit of openness:
archive.org/details/@emilian…
Franco Grignani interviewed by Swiss television during his exhibition at the Galleria Flaviana, Locarno, 1966
In 1940, Franco Grignani was called up by the army at the start of WWII. He served as an officer teaching aircraft spotting. Training others to spot shapes quickly leads him to the core of his later visual analysis — the interdependence of eye and mind.
September 22, 1969 - first exhibit of the Exhibition Design (ED) group at Palazzo Reale in Milan, aiming to explore the convergence between the methodologies of graphic design and those of industrial design. When ‘experimental design’ actually drew a crowd....
part of the ED Group: Franco Grignani, Pino Tovaglia, Silvio Coppola, Giulio Confalonieri
francogrignani.info/the-ed-g…
1998: correspondence with Francesco Cossiga, President of the Italian Republic 1985-1992, then Senator for life
"I am pleased to inform you that the City Council has resolved to award you the Certificate of Civic Merit." [signed by the Mayor of Milan] - This Certificate is linked to the Ambrogino d'Oro, the city's highest honour, awarded annually on December 7th, the patron saint's day.
"For me, it was a happy encounter with your work as an artist." [G.C. Argan, preeminent historian, critic, and theorist of twentieth-century art]
July 24, 1982: "I wish to inform you that the President of the Republic has been pleased to confer upon you the title of Commander of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic" [telegram signed by the Minister of the Interior]
