Lattoog Design officially launched its first furniture collection at the Craft+Design fair in São Paulo in 2005. The first piece created by the Rio-based duo Leonardo Lattavo and Pedro Moog dates back to 1999 and was the Knot Sofa, which to this day remains one of Lattoog Design’s flagship pieces.

Between 1999 and 2003, furniture design and manufacturing was a secondary activity for Leonardo and Pedro and was seen as a hobby. In 2003, when they came across the cover of an Italian magazine featuring a piece by the Campana brothers created in 2002 (the Boa sofa) that was very similar to the Knot Sofa, the duo concluded they “were doing something right,” and in 2004 they founded Lattoog Design, specializing in furniture, product, and interior design. In 2005, the name Lattoog emerged—a fusion of the two partners’ surnames, Lattavo and Moog—synthesizing the duo’s creative process: the joining of ideas from two minds, two different backgrounds, and two distinct creative processes, marked by a constant pursuit of originality.

Although there is no established rule in the designers’ creation process, much of the furniture concept begins with pencil—hand drawing is the main foundation of almost all the company’s pieces. Processes such as model-making or experimentation with new materials in the São Cristóvão prototyping workshop are the other pillar of Lattoog’s creation. Today, Lattoog’s production operates 100% through solid partnerships with suppliers from various Brazilian states, and because of this production-structure model, there are no limits on the choice of materials used—as Leonardo puts it: “we are not specialized in woodworking or metalwork—we are specialized in good design and good ideas.”

Both Leonardo and Pedro have an extensive output of architecture projects, paintings, drawings, and sculptures that permeate their furniture work—references and influences from architecture and the visual arts are present here.

In addition to not submitting to technical limitations—whether in material selection or the construction methodology adopted—Lattoog also does not limit itself to working only at the furniture scale. Large-scale projects have been developed in partnership with architect Doica Backheuser, of Blac Arquitetura—a long-time partner. Bridges, railway stations, shopping centers, stores, and corporate interiors are among the projects that have been on Lattoog’s drawing boards in recent months.

In a short time, Lattoog has already built a strong range of products and has been featured in several national and international design magazines, in addition to awards and exhibitions in Brazil and abroad, including the Global Edit exhibition in Milan—a selection of designers curated by Wallpaper magazine, which also resulted in a feature in the same publication. It also took part in the Brasil é Cosi exhibition, also in Milan.

Since its founding, Lattoog has specialized in manufacturing experimental furniture using diverse techniques, increasingly seeking to express Rio’s culture. This can be seen in the pieces developed for Schuster, which always take national and Rio culture as a guiding principle. Examples include armchairs and sideboards that reference the Portuguese-stone sidewalks of Rio de Janeiro; or the Pantosh Armchair, part of the ‘Vira Lata’ series, in which we make a literal reference to the mixed heritage of the Brazilian people through furniture that is the explicit result of a fusion of two other well-known pieces.

Lattoog Design’s directors and designers are:

Leonardo Lattavo – Architect and Urban Planner with a master’s degree in Architecture from University College London. He has carried out several architecture and interior projects in England, Italy, Spain, and Germany. He worked on the design team for two towers in Liverpool that were selected by the Royal Institute of the British Architects (RIBA) as one of the seven best projects in the United Kingdom in 2007. He also designed several stores for the Italian luxury brand Gucci. Between 1997 and 2004, he lived in London and traveled around the world before returning to Brazil to found Lattoog Design together with Pedro Moog. He currently works in the fields of architecture, design, and the visual arts.
Pedro Moog – Self-taught designer with an academic background in Business Administration. He has worked in design since 1997 with his own design company—Moog Studio—which later merged with Lattoog Design. Like Leonardo, he has worked in the fields of architecture, design, and the visual arts.

 

Awards

1994 Remantec Design Competition, São Paulo. Modular Seating System Project. Honorable Mention
2004 International Competition ‘Earthquake Memorial’, Taiwan. Memorial / Landscape Project – Honorable Mention
2005 Maurice Valansi Design Competition, Rio de Janeiro. Seating project – Honorable Mention
2006 Salão Casa Brasil Award 2006, Rio Grande do Sul. Seating project and prototype – Finalist Project.
2006 Tacchini International Competition, London. ‘Something to Sit on’ – Armchair project – Honorable Mention
2007 Salão Casa Brasil Award 2007, Rio Grande do Sul. Table and bench project and prototype – Finalist Project.
2007 Royal Institute of the British Architects Award. Mixed-use building project ranked among the ten best built in the United Kingdom. (Project done for AHMM Architects).
2008 Museu da Casa Brasileira Award 2008, São Paulo. Table and bench project and prototype – Finalist Project.

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