Felicia Ferrone is an architect, designer, academic, and entrepreneur. Her international namesake brand fferrone, with locations both Chicago and Milan, is known for delivering the unexpected through a seemingly simple gesture. Archetypes are reinvented; typologies are crossed and blended. European influences, minimalist aesthetics, mastery of proportion, and meticulously considered details are the hallmarks of fferrone. Often lighthearted and whimsical, the furniture and objects are timeless. Through close collaborations with master artisans, each piece is handcrafted allowing for innovative use of materials and production techniques, underlying another fundamental attribute to her design philosophy and approach merging form and function.
Born in Chicago, Felicia Ferrone graduated with a degree in architecture from Miami University, Ohio, after which she moved to Milan, Italy. Ferrone’s expansive reach is informed by her early experience as an architect in Milan, where she was first taught to “blur boundaries.” In a series of positions with some of Italy’s most notable design luminaries she developed her belief that all aspects of design are interdependent and always in relation to the environment, objects, and systems that surround it.
Ferrone’s award winning work of glassware, home accessories and furniture designs have been widely exhibited, published internationally, and included in museum collections. She was recently included in Phaidon’s historical survey of women as one of 200 women who have contributed to the field of design in the book, Woman Made: Great Women Designers by Jane Hall. In addition to her studio practice, Felicia is the Director of Undergraduate Studies in Industrial Design and a Clinical Associate Professor at theUniversity of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), and previously a lecturer at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago for many years.
Producing and distributing her own designs under her brand, fferrone, Felicia also does commissioned work for clients, such as Audi, Boffi, and The Macallan among others. Clients include: The French Laundry, Per Se, Trussardi, Audi, Rimadesio, Bulthaup, Poliform, Molteni, Minotti, Peck, Flexform, Meridiani, Ernestomeda, Arclinea, Starbucks, Society Limonta, and high end hotels around the world.