Miguel Milá receives the Compasso d'Oro in recognition of his career history and his contribution to the promotion of Spanish design

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"Without raising his voice, without major theories, quietly, Milá has shaped our gestures and our desires. He has achieved what few creators attain: we see the world through his eyes, and we feel it through his touch". Pedro Azara

On 26 June last Miguel Milá became the first Spanish designer to receive the Compasso d'Oro, awarded for the last 21 years by the Italian Associazione per il Disegno Industriale and one of the world's most prestigious industrial design awards

22/06/2008
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The award ceremony took place in the square of the spectacular Royal Palace of Venaria and formed part of the activities held on the occasion of Torino World Design Capital 2008. Giovanni Cutolo (Vice-chairman of the ADI) handed over the Compasso d'Oro award for his career to an emotional Miguel Milá.

This award represents well-deserved international recognition for his major contribution to the development of industrial design in Spain, to its dissemination abroad and to laying the foundations of modern design, creating objects which recreate the poetry of the simple object and correspond to the need always to create from rigour and honesty. The Compasso d'Oro is moreover a perfect culmination to a productive career which has been widely recognized in Spain: he won the Delta de Oro of ADI FAD on six occasions, the first in 1961 for his TMC lamp; he obtained the National Design Award in 1987 and was decorated with the Creu de Sant Jordi which the Generalitat (Autonomous Government) of Catalonia awards.

As Pedro Azara wrote in his text "La vida cómoda" from the book Miguel Milá published by Santa & Cole on the occasion of the 2003 Design Year: "Milá designed for himself and for his family. His world is what surrounds him, what he finds within reach. But, like great creators, like the quiet artists (such as Albert Ràfols Casamada or Maria Girona, whom he admires and respects) he has made a world out of his world, out of a corner of his world. He succeeded in converting his secret garden into a model for everyone. Thanks to him we all stretch out our arms and move our hands toward his objects as he did before with a view to conceiving them and, above all, to shaping them. His habits became our habits. Without raising his voice, without major theories, quietly, Milá has shaped our gestures and our desires. He has achieved what few creators attain: we see the world through his eyes, and we feel it through his touch."

Thanks, Miguel, for giving us so many works which exude the serene beauty of your tireless search for simplicity!

XXI Compasso d'Oro Award

The international jury
Mario Bellini, Architect (Chairman), Milan
Chew Moh-Jin, Technologist, Singapore
Lieven Daenens, Director of the Design Museum of Gent, Belgium
Carla Di Francesco, Director of the PARC, Rome
Carlo Forcolini, Former chairman of the ADI, designer, Milan
Norbert Linke, Designer, Germany - Belgium
Emanuele Pirella, Author, Milan
Richard R. Witaker, Architect, USA

Award for career history
Luigi Caccia Dominioni
Renato De Fusco
Tito D'emilio
Dino Gavina
Michele Provinciali
Tobia Scarpa
Terence Conran
Miguel Milá

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