Brand Spotlight
Olivari
Italian Designer Door Handles · Borgomanero, Italy · Est. 1911
Since 1911, Olivari has made door handles in Borgomanero, a small town in northern Italy. Battista Olivari founded the company, and his wife Antonietta Ramelli took over in 1926, at a time when few women ran a business. The third generation of the family runs it today. For close to a century, Olivari has worked with the great names of Italian architecture: Gio Ponti, Franco Albini, Vico Magistretti and Joe Colombo designed for them, and more recently Piero Lissoni, Patricia Urquiola, Zaha Hadid and Jean Nouvel have too. Each handle is a small piece of design history you use every day.
An Italian Institution
For more than a century, Olivari has been the name behind the handle. The company began as a small brass works in Borgomanero, and by 1929 its illustrated catalogue offered a full range of cast brass door sets. The family was already building a reputation for craft that would last generations.
Olivari never stood still. In 1970 it launched Boma, the first coloured plastic door handle: a bold, rounded design by Monti G.P.A., made in red, black, grey and white. Few companies have moved so easily between old-world brass and modern design, and that range is what has kept Olivari at the heart of Italian architecture for more than a hundred years.
The third generation of the family runs the company today, and every handle is still made at Olivari’s own factory in Borgomanero, a few streets from where it all began.
Everything Olivari makes is made in Olivari’s own factory in Borgomanero, from start to finish. Each handle starts as a bar of certified brass. It’s hot-forged, machined, ground, polished and plated in-house, then laser-marked with the Olivari name. Their Superfinish PVD coatings resist scratches and tarnish, so a handle keeps its colour for years of daily use.
Finishes
Every Olivari handle is available in chrome, Superfinish PVD and matt finishes, all applied at the Borgomanero factory.
Bright Chrome
CR
Satin Chrome
CO
Matt Black
NP
Matt White
BP
SuperStainless Steel Satin
IS
SuperNickel Bright
NL
SuperNickel Satin
NS
SuperGold Bright
ZL
SuperGold Satin
TS
SuperCopper Satin
RS
SuperBronze Satin
DS
SuperAnthracite Satin
US
“The Olivari family has handed down its attention to details, the search for innovation, and mainly a passion for its work, from generation to generation.”
Gallery
Browse interiors from around the world featuring Olivari’s Italian door handles, from landmark hotels to private homes. Open the gallery to filter by category, style and finish.
Resources
Bradford’s Point of View
Why Bradford loves Olivari
We’ve long admired Olivari’s place where architecture and hardware meet. More than a century of work with Italy’s greatest designers means an Olivari handle is a piece of design history, and it’s still forged and finished under one roof in Borgomanero. It’s a philosophy that feels deeply aligned with our own at Bradford Hardware, where the details are never just details.
