Ettore Sottsass developed his essential, architectural design language in Milan in the postwar decades in 1981. Sant’Ambrogio & De Berti, a Milanese manufacturer known primarily for its brass-framed mirrors, also produced a series of wood-and-glass coffee tables, of which this grid model is a recognized example. The design draws on Sottsass’s recurring interest in layering, achieved here by setting a lattice of wood strips beneath a glass surface, turning a flat tabletop into a study in depth and shadow.