10/05/2026
Iconic Ball and Chain: Serie Up by Gaetano Pesce 1969
Like Diamonds good design lasts forever. ♦️
A red vertion of the Armchair and Pouf festured in the 1971 Bond film Diamonds Are Forever -
Sean Connery Photographed by Terry O’Neill.
Alicita Rodriguez - wrote in 2012
For anyone lucky enough to have seen designer Gaetano Pesce in person, you are bound to know that the man speaks in tongues. His vocabulary is full of metaphors and his anecdotes full of contradictions—and yet, Pesce is irresistible.
He said something to this effect—that we must honor women because they are the future. Serie Up 2000 illustrates this very paradox, at once paying homage to the female form and simultaneously presenting a critique of that adoration.
Serie Up takes its shape from the dramatic dips and curves of a woman’s body. Its accompanying ottoman, a perfect sphere, resembles both a ball of yarn and a ball and chain. Pesce explains that the orb symbolizes “the shackles that keep women subjugated.”
B&B Italia released the Serie Up “Compasso d’Oro Edition”, available in just 500 numbered pieces. UP5_6 upholstered in the exclusive CD fabric in antique gold, while the spherical ottoman in bronze fabric will be tied to the armchair by means of an aluminum chain with corten finish.
We have one of these limited edition on display in our Ballsbridge showroom.
Since 1966, B&B Italia has manufactured luxury goods for residential interiors and exteriors, as well as products for the contract market. Known for their collaborations with iconic designers like Gaetano Pesce, Patricia Urquiola, Zaha Hadid, and Antonio Citterio, B&B Italia has a stellar reputation in the industry—their trademark synthesis of innovation and classical craftsmanship has garnered no less than four Compasso d’oro prizes
