Up for auction is this teal blue/green Olivetti Lettera 22 Portable Typewriter with Original Carrying Case both Made In Italy. The Typewriter is in Very Good Used Condition. All Keys hammer down smoothly with no sticking. Ribbon will need replacing depending on how much you want to use it. The Case is in excellent condition and shows very little wear and the zipper works perfect. The typewriter is in excellent condition also with slight scratches on both sides by the shift keys. Comes with original booklet. This color is on the rarer side and more desirable. Very nice classic Vintage Item.
Please view all pictures provided. Here is some information on this item.
The Olivetti Lettera is a portable mechanical typewriter designed by Marcello Nizzoli in 1949 or, according to the company's current owner Telecom Italia, 1950.[1] This typewriter was very popular in Italy, and it still has many fans. It was awarded the Compasso d'oro prize in 1954. In 1959 the Illinois Institute of Technology chose the Lettera 22 as the best design product of the last 100 years.
The typewriter is sized about 27x37x8 cm (with the carriage return lever adding about 1–2 more centimeters in height), making it quite portable at least for the time's standards, even though its 3.7 kg (8.2 lb) weight may limit portability somewhat.
The Lettera 22 is an oblique frontstroke typebar typewriter. The typebars strike a red/black inked ribbon, which is positioned between the typebar and the paper by a lever whenever a key is pressed; a small switch located near the upper right side of the keyboard can be used to control the strike position of the ribbon, in order to print with black, red, or no ink (for mimeograph stencils).
Ribbon movement, which also occurs at every key press, automatically reverses direction when there is no ribbon left on the feed reel; two mechanical sensors, situated next to each wheel, move when the ribbon is put under tension (indicating ribbon end), attaching the appropriate wheel to the ribbon transport mechanism and detaching the other.
The Lettera 22 uses a basket shift or segment shift (that is, the unit including the typebars moves up and down when shifting, as opposed to the carriage shift system). The Lettera 22 is quite compact compared to other 1950s portable typewriters using a basket shift, such as the Smith Corona Sterling or Remington-Rand Quiet-Riter.
The Lettera 22 also features a tabulator setting and clearing system that is controlled from the keyboard, and an innovative margin release that does double duty as a paragraph indentation key (it indents a paragraph when it is held down as the carriage is returned).