When attendees at Bottega Veneta’s spring 2025 show in Milan on Saturday took their seats, they didn’t find themselves on the spindle-back chairs or carefully arranged rows of benches you might expect at a fashion show. Instead, they sunk into animal-shaped leather lounge chairs resembling dogs, bunnies, chickens, and elephants.
Matthieu Blazy is no stranger to creating a memorable set: For his spring 2023 show, guests sat on resin chairs designed by Gaetano Pesce. Yet his squishy menagerie has particularly captivated the internet, especially as videos of stars like A$AP Rocky and Jacob Elordi relaxing in the comfy creations have gone viral on Tiktok. (The latter, by the way, was assigned a bunny.)
So, what’s the story behind these fashionable beanbags? Let us explain.
Blazy was inspired by the Zanotta Saccho chair, originally designed in 1968 by Italian modernists Piero Gatti, Cesare Paolini, and Franco Teodoro. For the time, its blobby shape was rather revolutionary: unlike most seats before it, the Saccho chair was completely devoid of rigidity, utterly embracing comfort. It reflected the wider cultural shift from the button-upped 1950s toward the more experimental and freewheeling 1960s and 1970s.
Now, 56 years later, Blazy has decided to give the chair a nostalgic spin. His spring 2025 was based on the concept of childhood—“I was interested in the idea of wow, the wonder you have as a kid when you try something—it’s almost like primal fashion, your first experience of fashion when you try your parents’ clothes,” he told Vogue’s Nicole Phelps. The beanbag chairs symbolized that joyous and playful sensibility, riffing on the kind of furniture you now might find in a child’s bedroom. “It was like we were all kids again in a rec room, knees tucked under our chins, eager to watch our favorite show on TV,” Phelps added.
Bottega Veneta confirms to Vogue that the seating spanned 15 animal and insect types: dogs, pandas, rabbits, ladybirds, snake, birds, chickens, dinosaurs, otters, elephants, cats, foxes, bears, horses, and whales—a veritable Noah’s Ark that set sail in a sea of nostalgic reverie rather than biblical chaos. “It was the idea of The Ark: a joyful world with a sense of wonder, populated by friendly companions that make you smile and say ‘wow,’” Blazy says. “Crafted entirely in leather, they sit low to the ground, so you have a different perspective when you sit on them—they are both joyful and comfortable! I hope this sense of wonder continues every time people come across them.”
Which you actually could, by the way. In December, a limited number of Bottega Veneta’s Sacco chairs will be sold at Design Miami, the preeminent design fair in Miami, Florida, that runs concurrently with Art Basel. The Bottega Veneta beanbag chairs are also available on the house’s online store.
This article was first published on Vogue.com.
