Mario Botta is a Swiss architect born in 1943 in Mendrisio, Ticino. He studied at the University Institute of Architecture in Venice under Carlo Scarpa and Giuseppe Mazzariol, worked with Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn, and opened his practice in Lugano in 1970. His buildings span houses, schools, libraries, museums and sacred architecture, and in 1996 he co-founded the Accademia di architettura in Mendrisio.
For Riva 1920 he designed the Clessidra Stool, carved from a single block of scented cedar. Two semicircular forms are set one above the other to describe an hourglass, a compact and rigorously geometric object that reflects the clarity of his architecture.
