Campari Soda's Milan Design Week Collab Is Its Most Playful Yet
Italian design doesn’t get more iconic than Campari Soda. For the last 90 years, the drink has been a symbol of Italian culture and innovation, right from the moment Davide Campari’s company decided to launch the first single-serve aperitif that mixed a cocktail bitter with soda directly in the bottle, in the right proportions, way back in 1932.
The design of the bottle followed in a similar pioneering fashion. Designed by Italian futurist artist and designer Fortunato Depero, whose concept threw tradition to the wayside. Depero's bottle was shaped like a flipped cocktail goblet, made of frosted glass, and featured embossed branding as opposed to the paper labels most other alcoholic beverages had at the time. The impact was huge and immediate, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Yet Campari Soda is not one to rest on its design laurels. Over the last few years, its Design Connection platform has seen the famous aperitif brand partner with the leaders of the creative world. This year is no different. At 2023 Milan Design Week, Campari Soda will debut its collaboration with Queeboo, the Italian design brand founded by Stefano Giovannoni.
For the project, Qeeboo has created four distinct objects that are as attention-demanding as the bottle that inspired them. The "Giraffe In Love" is perhaps the boldest and most playful: The giraffe stands at 2.65 meters tall (!!) and carries a chandelier made of Campari Soda bottles. It's both elegant and ironic and definitely a piece that will stop you in your tracks.
The "Turtle Carry Drinks" is also a really fun piece and does what it says on the tin – it's a turtle sculpture with a glacette (wine cooler) on its back, designed to keep your Campari Soda cool as you mingle with the crowd. Elsewhere, there's a "Sweet Brother Tom" lamp, which is an extension of Qeeboo's "Sweet Brothers" lamp family but with a Campari Soda twist. And last, but no means least, another reinterpretation of a Qeeboo classic series, the Rabbit, which has been created in collaboration with illustrator Alice Hoffman who covered the creature in bright colours inspired by the bottle.
Campari Soda's Qeeboo collab marks the latest in a string of solid designer link-ups. In 2022, the brand joined forces with Alessi on two household items — a steel mirror and a lamp — that incorporated the bottle within the object's design and aspired to enhance the chill, soul-warming atmosphere of aperitif o'clock.
In 2021, it unveiled a partnership with Marco Oggian. Together, they presented "DUO: the #SenzaEtichette (without labels) stool," a fun, graphic-covered, Campari Soda-shaped barstool that initially appears as one object yet splits in the middle to become two separate stools. The design represented togetherness and moments of sharing joy (or, in this case, a drink) with close friends. Oggian x Campari Soda also launched the first #SenzaEtichette NFT artworks, which saw the artist re-interpret the iconic bottle in four videos.
The Design Connection series launched in 2020 and kicked off with a series of three designers — Serena Confalonieri, Agustina Bottoni, and Matteo Agati — who spun their unique takes on three separate reinterpretations of the bottle. The resulting lamp, coat stand, and clock set a precedent for an exciting design series that promises to continue for many years to come.
You'll be able to admire the Campari Soda x Qeeboo collaboration at the Qeeboo Milan store for the duration of 2023 Milan Design Week. The collection will also be on display during our exclusive Campari Soda ft. Highsnobiety event at the streetwear boutique One Block Down. Catch you there?
Find out more about Campari Soda here.
