The clock that made time flip
In a small Italian town in the 1950s, Remigio Solari patented the split-flap display—an invention destined to revolutionize how we see time. It was an immediate success, adopted worldwide for arrival and departure boards in stations and airports.
Fermo, his brother with the business vision, reached out to architect Gino Valle to turn this invention into everyday objects. From that collaboration came the Cifra 5, an elegant, simple clock that synthesized technology, design, and communication.
The genius was in the flaps themselves. That distinctive sound—cards shuffling, pages turning—created instant recognition. In train stations and airports, millions of people would pause, watching the flaps cascade into place, revealing destinations and departures. The sound became synonymous with travel, with possibility.
Ten years later, Valle created a smaller version. Massimo Vignelli handled the typography, adapting Helvetica with subtle optical adjustments for hours and minutes. The result was the Cifra 3—a marvel of form and function, one of the 20th century's design icons.
The Cifra 3 proved that displaying time could be both mechanical poetry and perfect functionality. Valle and Vignelli channeled the flow of time into a masterpiece of sophisticated simplicity.
"I don't make objects, I establish relationships" — Gino Valle
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