Франческо Рива heads the factory RIVA MOBILI D’ARTE, that is, "Works of furniture art of the Riva family." In the title, he wanted to emphasize what makes the furniture unusual, the author in the full sense of the word. And the name Riva in the title underlines Francesco's connection with the company M.A.RIVA, which was founded more than 50 years ago by his father Felice Riva.

Francesco decided to start his own business after learning to be an artist at the famous Brera Academy of Fine Arts in Milan and working in his father’s factory. He says that he always wanted to make unusual classic furniture that would combine traditional craft technologies and a high flight of design ideas. The conquest of the furniture market a young, ambitious designer began with America. “In 1989, together with my sister Fabian, I founded a new company. When I went to the USA, there was no production at all, but there were only two sketches from my first Direttorio collection that I showed to everyone,” Francesco recalls.

The experiment was successful, and now the designer releases a new collection of furniture on average once every two years. Anything can be a source of inspiration for him. For example, the Hermitage collection appeared under the influence of Russian classical furniture and Russian classical interiors. “Although the collection is called the Hermitage, you will find elements from the interior of the Bolshoi Theater in it,” he says. The collection of children's furniture Dolly Francesco invented for his five-year-old daughter, but then was surprised to find that she likes other little girls. And the source of inspiration for the Giardino Italiano collection was the old greenhouse of the 17th century, Villa Carlotta on Lake Como. First, the designer came up with a window display, the upper part of which repeated some elements of the greenhouses, then a bed, sofas, chairs, consoles, and so on. "I found the central element of the decor, made the central item of the collection, and the remaining items began to appear by themselves," Francesco jokes.