If you are thinking about going to Paris soon, I would suggest that you visit the Musée National d’Art Moderne - Center Georges Pompidou.

The architecture of the Beaubourg has always fascinated me. It was designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers in 1977 and looks like a surrealist sculpture.
Critics have described the Pompidou Museum as an “oil refinery in the city center”. The architects’ intention was to place service systems, such as water and electricity, outside the building and consequently turn it inside out.

Read the rest of this entry »

Good morning everyone.
My name is Valeria and I’m the Assistant to the Board of Direction and the President, Paolo Trento, one of the founders of Mandarina Duck.
For more than 20 years, I’ve been working for this company and I’ve seen everything there is to see. I’m not very skilled with computers and the Internet but I’ve always been very curious. So, with the help of some younger colleagues, I’m going to try to write some posts on Mandarina Duck’s history.

But first, I would like to tell you how Mandarina Duck’s brand name was created. When the company was still located in a basement in Bologna and its products were still labeled Plastimoda, Paolo Trento and Pietro Mannato, the founders, knew they had a potential goldmine with the Utility, better known as the “small, colored bag” which would become Mandarina’s symbol in a few years. They had decided to invest some money in advertising and chose the Italian fashion magazine with the best reputation, Vogue.

Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to Mandarina Duck’s corporate blog.

The first question that came to my mind when this project was mentioned to me was: Why should a company have a blog?
Reflecting on who we are, the answer was obvious: Mandarina Duck has always been distinguishing itself as an innovative company.
This can be seen in our history, which was strongly linked to the foresight and passion for work of our founders, Paolo Trento and Pietro Mannato. But there’s more. Our products, our choice of materials, our communication and the partnerships we have initiated in recent years are all based on innovation, which is both the past and the future of Mandarina Duck.

Read the rest of this entry »

Here on Duck Side we’ll talk about everything (things we’re interested in and things you’re interested in).
We do have some good-manner rules, like every respectable salon.
We would ask everyone to follow them when leaving comments. Respect and good education above all.

Read the rest of this entry »

Stories, experiences, ideas, projects, good choices and a few mistakes. Colour, life and fun outside the box. More than anything else, people, minds, hard work and some well-deserved smiles at the end of the day.
And plenty of the here and now: the world around us, fashion and style, the Internet. How we live with them and how they influence our daily lives. Keeping the future in sight, things we want to do, things we’ll eventually do and things we’ll never do. After all this is a blog, where could we dream, if not here?

Read the rest of this entry »