He did, however, have a modus vivendi. He might be accused of creative dabbling in the pre-war years, but post-war he knew that Italy - and by extension, the entire war-torn world - needed enlightened rebuilding from top to bottom, rather than slavish historicist reconstruction. But as with that “Superleggera” chair, he realized that traditional Italian ways of living could be tweaked for the modern era rather than ditched altogether. He liked the idea of the ordinary, unaffected, house, the “Domus” - which was also the name he gave his design magazine, founded in 1928. He saw no reason why ordinary people should not benefit from good design. If they could not afford good works of art, he reasoned, they could buy excellent Ponti fabrics, cutlery, chairs, washbasins or whatever. And not just by Ponti: his studio allegedly worked on the principle of the Renaissance artists’ in that other artists were always being brought forward there to be leaders, not mere assistants. Certainly some big design names emerged from beneath Ponti’s wing, but I suspect everyone always knew who was the boss.