The aluminium Moka Express coffee maker | Alfonso Bialetti, 1933

Alfonso Bialetti                                                                                Paul Campani, L’omino con i baffi

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Alfonso Bialetti (1888–1970) was an engineer who became famous for acquiring Luigi De Ponti’s invention of the simple yet elegantly designed Moka Express coffeemaker. Designed in 1933, the coffee pot has been a style icon since the 1950s.

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It may also be referred to as a Moka, Moka pot, a Bialetti, a percolator or a stove-top coffeemaker, and in Italian as la Moka, la macchinetta (“the little machine”) or la caffettiera.

L’omino con i baffi – the Moka mascot – was based on a humorous cartoon doodle of Alfonso Bialetti. The initial sketches and logo were created in 1953 by Paul Campani. The fame of the Bialetti brand was further strengthened by means of significant investments in advertising on Carosello, a well-known Italian television programme, and a message with the image of the “Little man with a moustache” as the central character, created in the 1950s by artist Paul Campani.

Paul Campani

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Mark Tungate describes the Italian advertising tradition as follows: The Italians advertising was permanently marked by something called Carosello – the carousel –or a merry-go-round which was a fixed ten- minute advertising slot screened every day at around 8.45pm from the late 1950s until the mid 1970s

Alfonso Bialetti left