Carlo Scarpa “Argo” Oval Table for Simon Gavina, Red Travertine, Italy, 1975
This oval table is a contemporary production of Carlo Scarpa's "Argo" design for Simon Gavina, executed in solid red travertine marble. The table stands on a sculptural pedestal base composed of stacked, stepped travertine blocks, a form that reads almost as a fragment of classical architecture reduced to furniture scale. The oval top rests directly on this fluted column, its surface left largely unadorned so the material itself, veined and warm in tone, carries the visual weight of the piece. The proportions are deliberately monumental: the base tapers upward with a rhythm of setbacks that recalls temple plinths and Venetian stonework, while the tabletop cantilevers outward with a lightness that belies the density of the stone beneath it.
Carlo Scarpa designed the Argo table as part of the Ultrarazionale collection for Simon Gavina, a body of work in which the architect translated his lifelong engagement with historical Venetian and Roman architecture into freestanding objects. Trained as an architect rather than an industrial designer, Scarpa approached furniture with the same sensitivity to stratification, material honesty, and classical reference that defined his built work, from the Olivetti showroom to the Brion tomb. The Argo table belongs to this same architectural logic: a design that treats a dining table as a small building, with a base, a column, and a crown.
Height: 28.75 in (73 cm)
Width: 78.75 in (200 cm)
Depth: 46.46 in (118 cm)
1975
Contemporary
Red Travertine
Lonigo, IT
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