Opinion Ciatti - Original Ptolomeo Corten bookcase with Corten base h160

Original Ptolomeo needs no introduction, simple, revolutionary, innovative, sudden as an intuition, surprising as its success.

It’s a container that hides its shape to give priority to its content, it eliminates the "superfluous" to highlight the essential, or books. The bookcase looks like a simple metal column to which are joined thin metal shelves. Shelves that disappear as the column is filled with books, until they become completely imperceptible as if the books supported themselves.

Designed by Bruno Rainaldi, winner of the Compasso d'Oro 2004. Original Ptolomeo was born from observation and translates into a piece of furniture a simple but ingenious idea, transforming a stack of books into a design object. A bookcase as "banal" as it is bold, to become a contemporary icon, a harmonious work of art and as a work of art, for its own protection, signed on the basis of the designer’s signature.

Available in three different heights, Original Ptolomeo rests on a solid base - in stainless steel or lacquered metal coordinated with the structure - specially designed to ensure full stability.

Slender, slender and essential, it takes up little space and can be placed in all contexts from the most traditional to the most contemporary thanks to its different finishes (black, white, stainless steel or corten effect) able to adapt to any type of environment.

Original Ptolomeo a tribute to books and to the one who first remembers history took care of it. That Ptolemy I Sotere to whom we owe the idea in the third century. a.c. of the Royal Library of Alexandria of Egypt.

Bruno Rainaldi

Bruno Rainaldi was born in Milan in 1952. His training was hands-on, having started at a young age to work in design communication. In his early years in Milan he managed the first High-Tech emporium in Corso di Porta Ticinese, moving on to work first alongside Maddalena De Padova in the historical showroom in Corso Venezia and then with Enrico Baleri as partner in Baleri & Associati, where he was in charge of defining communication strategies for design companies and stores. His beginnings as an autodidact encouraged him in later life to ironically and anti-celebratively define himself as a “street designer” and his style as “chaotically rigorous”.

In the mid-1980s he founded Studio Rari – of which he became the soul and creative director. He also started working as art director with some of the top Italian design companies, leading his name to be associated, amongst others, with Alivar, Casprini, MDF Italia, Mussi Italy, Sintesi, Slamp, Terzani. His encounter, in those same years, with the Ciatti family marked the beginning of an important personal and artistic alliance, that led to the establishment first of CCR and then of Opinion Ciatti.

In the early 2000s, his career took a turn towards the world of design. In 2002, together with Marta Giardini, he founded ENTRATALIBERA, a very special space in the heart of Milan dedicated to design and design culture, sales and encounters. At the same time, his focus shifted to studying and creating objects, furnishing accessories and lamps, where the expertise gained over the years in this sector mingled with design inventions.

Amongst the numerous pieced designed there is the Ptolomeo bookshelf, for which, in 2004, he was awarded the Compasso d’Oro. In 2006, together with the very young Lapo Ciatti, who had just entered the family business, he founded Opinion Ciatti, of which Bruno Rainaldi was President, partner and art director.

He passed away prematurely in February 2011.

Opinion Ciatti

Opinion Ciatti is a company founded in 1950 in Florence that produces accessories and design furnishing including bookcases, tables and chairs; for the home, work and common spaces. A wide range of concrete and very identifiable objects, able with their presence, their touch, to characterise an atmosphere, personalise an environment. It all begins with an intuition of Rolando Ciatti. As a curious and attentive observer of a world that is changing so fast around him, he understands that a place in the house must be found for that strange, new object – the television - which was about to shake the Italians habit. That’s how Ciatti was founded, in Borgo San Frediano, in Florence Oltrarno, as the first company in Italy to produce TV benches. In 2003  the Ciatti family meets Bruno Rainaldi. Along they found CCR design, a new company focused on the development of home objects and accessories. Under the art direction of Mr Rainaldi, important names in Italian design start creating storage objects, chairs, mirrors, all characterized by a strong and bold personality. In 2004, Original Ptolomeo, the free-standing bookshelf by Bruno Rainaldi, wins the Compasso d’Oro award. Basic but revolutionary, new and with a great impact, as sudden as an intuition; Ptolomeo soon becomes the company’s best-selling item and an icon of contemporary design.