Sottsass Ettore, King Perry A., Olivetti

Typewriter Valentine

brand Olivetti, Valentine, Italy, design by Ettore Sottsass and Perry A. King, design fa Olivetti, 1969, plastic, four rows keyboard, pull-out cover with rubber handles (slightly damaged) and handle, dimensions 35 × 34,5 × 11 cm
The Olivetti typewriter immediately became a cult item after its launch. Its success lay in was that it was not just sold for technical purposes, but was conceived as a pop piece for for everyone. It became not only an icon of Italian design, but also a symbol of the historical moment in which between the profound social, political and cultural upheavals of the late 1960s... P. King, an assistant who collaborated on the machine's design, even suggested decorating each spool of the typewriter with an orange cap as a representation of a woman's nipple, perfectly reflecting the bold revolutionary thinking and explosiveness of the times. The machine was launched in 1969 and just a year later won the Compasso D'Oro award ADI award, and the following year it entered the prestigious MoMA collection. Star owners of the design icon included David Bowie (auctioned at Sotheby's, as part of singer's world-famous private design collection), Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. The machine was also given a role in the room of young Alex, the protagonist of Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971).