I've never quite been able to pin down Piero Fornasetti. Sometimes the slightly modern, slightly surrealist, slightly neo-classical Milanese designer's graphically intensive work feels crisp and fresh and great. And sometimes it feels like hopeless kitsch.
I'm going to have to put the "Luna" cradle in the second pile. Though technically, it's not Piero's design; it's by his son Barnaba. Piero died in 1988, and Barnaba took over the firm and began re-issuing and adapting illustrations and designs from his father's massive archive. According to his official bio, Barnaba created Luna in 1993. But the date marked on this numbered, limited edition is 1999.
Does that mean that "Luna" was a magazine rack before 1993, or between 1993-1999? Because the Los Angeles vintage dealer Dragonette says the bed's "based on a magazine holder." Sure enough, here it is, at Unica Home. At just $873, it's the least expensive Fornasetti magazine rack by half. Or the most expensive Fornasetti doll cradle. Either way, it's crazy.
Dragonette brought the Luna cradle to the Modernism antique show last November at the Park Avenue Armory, where it caught a lot of attention--and where it apparently didn't sell for $8,000. Seeing as how it's still on 1stdibs ten months later, I hope that if you're crazy enough to buy this goofy thing, you're not crazy enough to pay retail.
Limited Edition Piero Fornasetti [sic] Cradle at Dragonette [1stdibs.com via dt reader ep]
Fornasetti Magazine Racks - Luna, $873 [unicahome.com]
Related: Makes the similarly crazy, EUR2650 Puur Design BabyC cradle look positively sane by comparison
Not only that, but it clearly hasn't flown across the CPSC radar: looks like if the kid rocked hard enough the entire thing could flip and do serious, pointy impaling.