Gio Ponti in the American West

The only book devoted to the sole building ever built in the United States by the mid-century Italian master architect and designer, whose brand has a cult following and ever-growing popularity.

Opened in 1971, Denver Art Museum's north building, a seven-story structure -- with its distinctive cut-out roofline, narrow windows, and an exterior covered with more than a million custom-made glass tiles -- was one of the first high-rise art museums.
In 2020, after a two-year closure for renovations, the museum is reopening the Ponti building, which will include new architecture and design galleries featuring an exhibition of Ponti-designed objects from the Denver Art Museum and local collections.
The book will include both recent and historic photography, including many architectural details, and tell the story of how Gio Ponti, at the end of his long and remarkable career, created an architectural icon in the American West.

Dr. Mäkelä, former chair of the Department of Architecture at the University of Colorado Denver, will contribute an in-depth illustrated history of the building. Darrin Alfred, DAM Curator of Architecture and Design, will write about Ponti's design work using objects from the DAM collection as examples. Architect Jorge Silvetti will write about his admiration for Ponti's masterpiece from his perspective as one of the architects in charge of the renovations

About the Author:

Taisto Makela is the former chair of the Department of Architecture at the University of Colorado Denver. Darrin Alfred is the Denver Art Museum curator of architecture, design and graphics. Architect Jorge Silvetti is the Nelson Robinson, Jr. Professor of Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. His architecture firm, Machado and Silvetti, was founded in 1974 and has received numerous awards. Christoph Heinrich is the director of the Denver Art Museum since 2010, after having been the curator of modern and contemporary art. Salvatore Licitra is the grandson of Gio Ponti. He was the curator of the Gio Ponti retrospective "Tutto Ponti, Gio Ponti arch-designer" at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris