The history of companies is shaped by its people. Enterprising people that launch a project with the faith that a business is more than just a balance sheet. Antonio Riera Cortés, after taking over from his father, opted to take metalarte along the road to the future. Like an explorer in search of new worlds, Riera launched himself into the adventure of discovering the active design market in the Europe of the sixties. For him, Italy represented the eldorado of imagination. But, far from reproducing mimetic replicas of other products, he formed a group of pioneers willing to occupy a territory that was until then deserted and to convert it into a fertile one. In the seventies, Riera travelled to New York where he met George W. Hansen, with whom he was to establish a professional

and amicable relationship. As a result of this relationship, metalarte launches the famed -and much-imitated- Swing-arm lamp, which Hansen had designed at the end of the Second World War. Another great master of innovation was André Ricard who, with his famous Tatú lamp, revolutionised the Spanish market at the end of the sixties, not only because of its new concept of lighting destined for a specific use, but also for its aesthetic contributions. During this period of innovation, the pioneers created new references in the world of lighting with models that, while being wholly surprising at the time, ended up becoming classics. The Calder model 1974, named after the avant-garde artist that successfully combined the profound and playful in his creations, has remained in the catalogue after all these years.