Carles Riart, born in Barcelona in 1944, recently received the National Design Award 2011 in recognition of all his work. Carles Riart studied at the EINA school of design. He taught there from 1976 to 1978, and he also enhanced his training with a cabinetmaker. When he was nineteen years old, Riart founded the Gris shop of design-led objects. He also did interior design for some movies and designed many well-known spaces in the trendiest Barcelona: pubs, shops, and galleries such as the Montse Guillén restaurant (1981), the Piano Modas shop (1981), the Snooker Club (1985), the furniture for Fernando Amat's house at La Pedrera (1985), the Palau de la Virreina's furniture for Barcelona's city council Culture Department (1986), Ovideo TV's van (1989), the Dou Deu shop (1995), and many others.
His work has been featured in many exhibitions, and he has received numerous awards: the Delta de Oro ADI FAD (1970 and 1974), the Opinión award (1979), Delta de Plata ADI FAD and FAD interior design awards (1986), Furniture Contemporary Resources Council award (New York, 1983), European Top-Ten award (Cologne, 1994), Grand Prix of the Presse Internationale (Paris, 1994), and the Maestro Artesano diploma from the Centro Catalán de Artesanía, among others. Moreover, his Penjador Ona has been selected by the MOMA for its permanent collection. All this recognition has had an impact on the industry; in fact, the prestigious company Knoll International has manufactured some of his pieces. Lately, he has received the Spanish National Design Award (2011) as recognition for his entire career.
Some of Riart's most outstanding and brilliant pieces are: the Carlos Riart Chair (1979), the Vallvidrera armchair (1978), the Cómodo sofa, the Casas chair, the Ojalá and Pedrera chairs (1975), the Desnuda chair (1973), or the innovative Colilla hanging lamp, which Gabriel Ordeig later readapted for Santa & Cole. In 1989, Riart began working on what would become the most emblematic image of the Barcelona '92 Olympic Games, that is, the flaming arrow that inaugurated the Games, the main protagonist of a magical and ephemeral moment of worldwide anticipation. Riart has also worked on various customized furniture collections, such as Muebles Especiales (1976), Útiles (1992), Objetos Perdidos (1996), or the set designed for Josep Carreras (1996-2000) together with Pepe Cortés. All of Riart's pieces embody a sensual conception of comfort, formal poetry, talent, and strength.
