Giuseppe Terragni (April 18, 1904 - July 19, 1943) was born in the city of Meda in Lombardy. He worked primarily under the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini. He attended the Technical College in Como then studied architecture at the Politecnico di Milano university. In 1927 he and his brother Attilio opened an office in Como where he also built the majority of his work. The brothers collaborated until Giuseppe's death of tuberculosis in 1943.

A pioneer of the modern movement in Italy, Terragni produced some of its most significant buildings. A founding member of the fascist Gruppo 7 and a leading Italian Rationalist, Terragni fought to move architecture away from neo-classical and neo-baroque revivalism. In 1926 he and other progressive members of Gruppo 7 issued the manifesto that made them the leaders in the fight against revivalism.

In a career that lasted only 13 years, Terragni created a small but remarkable group of designs. Most of them were built in Como, which was one of the centers of the Modern Movement in Italy. These works form the nucleus of the language of Italian rationalist or modernistic architecture.

Terragni was also one of the leaders of the artistic group called "astrattisti comaschi" with Mario Radice and Manlio Rho, one of the most important events in Italian Modern Art. He also contributed to the 1932 Exhibition of the Fascist Revolution.

In his last designs, Terragni achieved a more distinctive Mediterranean character through the fusion of modern theory and tradition.