Recognizable by big and bold color schemes, zany geometric patterns and an adoration for squiggles and zig-zags, Memphis Style takes bits and pieces of influence from Art Deco, Pop Art and 1950s kitsch to create a design movement that valued form more than function. Memphis design style is a postmodern design movement, founded in Milan in 1980, defined by bold color, geometric shapes, squiggles, clashing patterns, and unconventional materials like laminate and terrazzo. Blurring the line between furniture and modern art, Memphis Style arose as a rebellious, vibrant response to the dark tones and seriousness of modern design’s status quo. Functionalism in design wasn’t enough for Ettore Sottsass, founder of the Memphis Group.
Instead, he said:
“Design should also be sensual and exciting.”
The Night of Defiant Design: How the Memphis Group Began
Milan, Italy. 1980. Around the table, Ettore Sottsass is surrounded by friends with steaming cups of espresso in one hand, sketchbooks in the other, each sharing their most recent furniture and lighting designs. On the record player, Bob Dylan’s “Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again” spins on. Too captivated by the conversation, no one rises to flip the vinyl when it skips. As the sun began to rise on the end of this energetic and creatively spirited evening, the group would birth a new movement of design under their collective name, the Memphis Group.
At the heart of Memphis Style is its founders’ desire to question: “What if?”
The collective’s time together was short-lived, and the Group officially disbanded before the end of the decade. Contrary to its loud personality, Memphis Style existed relatively quietly in the design world until 2006, when the Los Angeles County Museum of Art hosted the first major U.S. museum survey of Sottsass’s work. After the exhibition, the playful and imaginative style rose in popularity, and the 80s-era movement saw its influence grow far and wide: from designer Alessandro Mendini’s modernized Memphis Style skateboard design for streetwear brand Supreme, to walking the runway in Christian Dior’s 2011 Fall Couture line.
Memphis Milano
The Memphis Group’s designs created Memphis Milano, the Italian design brand that introduced the movement to the public in September 1981 at the Salone del Mobile in Milan with a collection of 55 pieces challenging the severity of modernism with their nonsensical and eccentric forms. Over the next several years, Memphis Milano continued to gather followers and present designs that put liberated creativity front and center. Non-conformist design objects like Martine Bedin’s Super Table Lamp and Sottsass’s Bay and Tahiti Table Lamps remain iconic creations of the Memphis Milano brand and the larger Memphis movement.
The Memphis Revival: Why the Style Is Back
Memphis never fully left, but its return has been decades in the making. Christian Dior’s Fall/Winter 2011–2012 haute couture collection was widely cited as an influence drawn from Memphis, and the movement’s motifs kept resurfacing across fashion, streetwear, and interiors.
The revival endures because Memphis answers a specific fatigue. After years of pared-back minimalism and gray-on-gray restraint, design-literate collectors have gravitated back toward color, pattern, and personality. Memphis offers a vocabulary for rooms that want to express something rather than recede.
Memphis Materials
The Memphis Group desired to create furniture that could subvert expectations of what was considered to be good design of the time. Using materials that were traditionally found in flooring, like laminate and terrazzo, Memphis Style instead uses these elements in an unexpected way by incorporating them into lighting fixtures and even tabletops.
Bend Goods’ Wave Table is an exceptional example of what happens when the line is blurred between furniture and modern art. The texture and appearance of a material one mostly sees in flooring becomes a conversational accent piece upon which to dine.
Squiggles, Zig-Zags, and Patterns
Memphis Style is all about patterns. Sottsass even created one of his own in 1978: “Bacterio,” which would become the Memphis Group’s signature pattern for furniture veneers and textiles. In a room that uses mostly muted tones, one piece with a lot of personality can truly pop.
Architect Robert Venturi coined the phrase “Less is a Bore” in support of postmodern design, and in contrast with the Bauhaus’ Mies Van der Rohe’s belief that “Less is More.” Memphis Style takes that adage to new heights and encourages the embrace of patterns: squiggles, stripes, zig-zags, and even polka dots, in all their glory.
Color Outside the Lines
While olive greens, deep blues and shades of merlot supplemented the white, gray and black-dominated palette of modernism, the Memphis Group deemed these tones simply too dull for their style that was designed to shock. Instead, Memphis Style uses pale pastels and mellowed-out, muted tones to complement the vibrant Pop Art-inspired primary colors that can all be found proudly clashing together in a single piece of furniture.
A canary-yellow legged, green-armed, blue-backed sofa might be quite the custom order, but bringing the vibrancy of Memphis Style into the home can be as simple as a large area rug that adds comfort and color, a whimsical but versatile stool that can be used as extra seating or side table storage, or a punchy decorative bookend that leads the eye to a well-curated bookshelf.
Think Outside the Box
At the heart of Memphis Style is its founders’ desire to question: “What if?” What if a sofa had spherical legs in lieu of the traditional rectangles? What if an armchair sported undulating curves rather than straight lines? What if design was not only a serious artistic pursuit, but also a playful experiment? The founders of Memphis Style wanted to break the mold, and by introducing common shapes in an uncommon way, the Memphis Group inspired designers across industries to think outside the streamlined box.
Finding triangles where rectangles are usually expected, or laminate spheres rather than traditional linen lamp shades adds an element of surprise that would bring a satisfied grin to the faces of Ettore Sottsass and his Memphis Style friends. With the right unexpected geometry, even the most commonplace fixtures like floor and table lamps come to life and light up a room with their animated personalities.
How to Bring Memphis Style Home
The most approachable way into Memphis design style begins with a single statement piece set against a restrained backdrop. A patterned rug, a sculptural lamp, or a terrazzo surface gives a room its point of view before anything else competes for attention.
For a measured start, the bright upholstery of a single chair or a set of throw pillows in a repeating print introduces the language of the movement without overwhelming a space. The more daring approach, in the spirit of the Memphis Group on that Italian evening, is the bold, statement-making couch, layered with clashing color and pattern until the room reads unmistakably Memphis.
Memphis Design Style FAQ
What Is the Difference Between Bauhaus and Memphis Style?
The Bauhaus championed functionalist, pared-down design, summarized in Mies van der Rohe’s maxim “less is more.” Memphis design style rejected that discipline in favor of decoration, color, and form over function, answering with Robert Venturi’s “less is a bore.” Where the Bauhaus pursued restraint, Memphis pursued expression.
Is Memphis Design 80s or 90s?
Memphis is an early-1980s movement. The group formed in 1980, debuted in 1981, and stayed active through 1987. Its visual language came to define the look of the decade.
What Is the Memphis Style of Art?
Memphis is a postmodern design and visual movement defined by bold color, geometric shapes, squiggles, clashing patterns, and unconventional materials like laminate and terrazzo. It treats furniture and objects as a form of expression, blurring the line between design and art.
What Is the 80s Design Style Called?
The defining postmodern design style of the 1980s is Memphis, also known as Memphis Milano after the Italian brand that introduced it. Its bold geometry and clashing color shaped everything from furniture to fashion and graphics throughout the decade.
