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Craft and Industrial Processes in Dialogue at EDIT Napoli 2024

Made by hand—or machine—these pure forms impresses us this year

Paolo Ferrarini

14 October 2024

The value we place on the handmade has led, in recent years, to a fascination with design that features imperfect forms, where evidence of the hands of makers are often more appreciated than the extreme precision derived from the use of machines. However, our observations at EDIT Napoli this year revealed a shift toward pure, bold geometry, characterized by simpler shapes, flat surfaces and often vibrant, playful colors. 

The Neapolitan fair—dedicated to authorial design—has, since its inception, been able to capture emerging trends in the sector, and this year is no exception. In the magnificent halls of the Naples State Archive, amidst established companies and emerging designers, we discovered a diverse array of projects—using aluminum, ceramics, porcelain, plastics, and techniques that range from digital printing to additive manufacturing. Handmade items were still present, and part of the fun of the fair was determining whether an item was born from the hand or the machine.

Arianna De Luca and Artetica

Roman designer Arianna De Luca unveiled Carosello Artigiano, produced by Eleit. This whimsical collection of bowls and containers is meant for savoring gelato, and was designed in collaboration with master gelato makers. Alongside this pastel-colored series, her delightful ceramic candle holders and mirrors framed in vivid hues captured our attention.

From Milan, Giorgia Conte and Sergio Di Pilato of Artetica brought a touch of surprise with their U collection, an intriguing series of handmade objects with digital-inspired forms. The ends, punctuated by two large holes, can be customized with incense holders, ashtrays or small vases for plants or flowers, making each piece a playful and functional design. In both collections, vibrant color and sinuous curves take the spotlight, adding a joyful twist to the world of ceramics. 

Tamborrino and Marco Ripa

Metal also took the stage at EDIT. Officine Tamborrino, a family business from Puglia, has been crafting steel furniture for three generations. For EDIT, they presented a curved version of Dedalo, a modular bookshelf designed by Alessandro Guerriero and Licio Tamborrino. The vibrant yellow color and the choice to adorn the surfaces with a collection of medicinal plants created a perfect dialogue with the frescoes and botanical collection in the historic hall.

Marco Ripa, on the other hand, embraced aluminum for the India collection, designed by Atelier Ferraro and entirely produced in the Marche region. Large tables with rounded edges and curved legs, ideal for both indoor and outdoor spaces, were paired with chairs where every weld was handmade and seamlessly invisible, resulting in pieces of absolute purity. To top it off, the India series is 100% recyclable.

MOT and M’Ama Edizioni

MOT stands for Memories of Today, a thoughtfully curated collection by Stormo Studio that brings memory-filled items to life. Defined by stainless steel, clean lines, bold colors and a variety of finishes, this collection of candle holders and vases transforms the way we display candles and flowers, offering unexpected and creative domestic landscapes.

Stainless steel and geometric shapes are also the centerpiece of Ballerina, an outdoor kitchen designed and crafted by M’ama Edizioni. Like a dancer, this perfectly round, freestanding element turns around it its center and is draped in vibrant, skirt-like fabrics that add both color and character.

Bluecycle and Mediterranea

3D-printed objects were featured at EDIT as well. Greek company Bluecycle transforms discarded fishing nets, once a threat to marine life, into playful furniture. These recycled materials are given a new life, becoming colorful tables, bookshelves and chairs. The innovative use of color creates dynamic gradients, formed by hand in real time as the machines layer the plastic, making each piece truly unique.

Mediterranea Design presented SuperEasy, a collection of 20 vases and containers crafted from PLA, a biodegradable plastic sourced from renewable and sustainable materials. These pieces stand out with their bold colors and playful, minimalist geometries.

Trama Studio and Marco Zelli

There are many ways to illuminate our living spaces, and Trama Studio offers a unique approach with Kandela, a collection of architectural beeswax candles. Designers Manuela and Francesca Pucciarini drew inspiration from Renaissance arches and columns, flipping these classical forms upside down to create vibrant, all-natural candles.

Meanwhile, Marco Zelli’s lamps resemble sculptures more than traditional lighting. Inspired by the minimalist works of Donald Judd, these pieces feature shiny surfaces painted in cyan, magenta and green. The design cleverly conceals the lightbulb, casting a soft glow that transforms the surrounding space.

Spaziointerno and Atelier Nuanda 

A “stipo” is a small cabinet, traditionally crafted from fine wood and adorned with intricate decorations, used for storing precious objects, papers and documents. This piece was popular until the 19th century. Parthenope, a new interpretation by Spaziointerno, reimagines this almost forgotten marvel. The cabinet’s wooden doors showcase a classic view of Naples, brought to life through an ancient inlay technique.

Atelier Nuanda interprets another classic piece: the folding screen. Their twist features repeating aluminum modules, artfully connected by a sophisticated leather weave, handcrafted from reclaimed leather.

De Marchi Verona and ISADxForma&Cemento

Design also allows us to play with geometric forms through surfaces. De Marchi Verona has introduced Numen, a new collection of indoor and outdoor porcelain tiles, designed by Doriana and Massimiliano Fuksas. It’s porcelain, not ceramic, and as such a material is incredibly durable, enabling decoration with a level of refinement and depth of color that other materials simply cannot achieve. The result is truly spectacular.

As for other unusual surfaces, Forma&Cemento collaborated with the Mexican school ISAD to create “Una gota en la Arena,” a collection of concrete sinks. The surfaces were crafted by reinterpreting classic elements of Mexican imagery, developed during a workshop held in the Chihuahua Desert and led by designer Alessandro Gorla, held in the Chihuahua Desert.

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Ten Forms of Lightness at Lake Como Design Festival

A selection of the most memorable works from the Italian design event

Paolo Ferrarini

18 September 2024

The Lake Como Design Festival reaches its sixth edition this year with “lightness” as its theme. Held in multiple venues—historical places, beautiful villas and city parks—in different parts of the city of Como, the selection of objects includes classics and novelties, design and art, showcasing a panorama of experimentation. Among the hundreds of objects on display, we have selected the ten that, in our opinion, best express the lightness of contemporary design.

Lightness on paper

The Como-based publishing house Lithos celebrates its 35th anniversary this year. Throughout its history, Lithos has collaborated with icons including Ettore Sottsass, Andrea Branzi and Enzo Cucchi, producing prints, engravings, lithographs and artists’ books. For this edition of the Festival, Lorenzo Butti, artistic director and founder of the Lake Como Design Festival, invited a series of architects, designers and international artists to create an original work dedicated to lightness. The result is Lightness on Paper, 10 works by Mario Botta, Michele De Lucchi, Natalie du Pasquier, DWA Studio, Francesco Faccin, Naessi Studio, Valeri Gaeti, Lucia Pescador, Franco Raggi and Mario Trimarchi will be exhibited in the evocative deconsecrated church of San Pietro in Atrio.

Images courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

8 days of Lightness by Erlands and Bai Bai

Do glass art and meditation have anything to do with design? Looking at the work of Erlands and Bai Bai, the answer is definitely yes. Erlands incorporates meditation into the design process to imagine objects and situations that do not yet exist. His work is then intertwined with that of Bai Bai, a glass artist who gives form to these visions. On display in Como are mysterious objects made of glass and metal that can be used to find physical balance during meditation, but also for exercise. Next to them are unique drawings on paper quick-drying glues instead of pigments.

Images courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

Homage to Ico Parisi

The beautiful Villa del Grumello hosts the group exhibition “Lightness in progress” in a breathtaking room overlooking Lake Como, a tribute to designer Ico Parisi. A beautiful carpet inspired by the light reflections on the surfaces of the lake, an interplay of volumes and transparencies in a crystal and rosewood coffee table topped by the Luisa vase in Murano glass, and on the surrounding walls visitors discover some surprising, unpublished photographs taken by the architect between 1968 and 1970. 

Image courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

Close to the Edge by Mario Trimarchi

The rooms of Villa del Grumello also host contemporary artists including Mario Trimarchi. The Sicilian-born Milanese designer is known for his industrial design objects, but in this exhibition he surprises us with his mastery of drawing a series of unique research pieces. On the walls we find incredibly detailed and realistic pencil drawings of stones. On a central table we find glasses made of very thin glass resting on stone bases. In this way we find ourselves thinking about the boundaries between lightness and heaviness, between natural and artificial, between spontaneity and design.

Images by Paolo Ferrarini

Equilibrio Instabile by Jean-François D’Or

As in previous editions, one of the most interesting sections is certainly the Contemporary Design Selection, curated by Giovanna Massoni. With Equilibrio Instabile, Euology to Audacity, the Belgian designer Jean-François D’Or has literally reinvented Columbus’s egg. Inspired by a conversation with a neuroscientist, he set out to create an object capable of representing the concept of audacity. The result is 100 wooden cubes topped by a wooden egg that can stand still thanks to a magnetic support. A matter of millimeters, it’s easier to let it roll away than to keep it balanced. 

Images courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

Micare Obscuro by Dora Stanczel and Pietre Trovanti

Dora Stanczel is an artist who specializes in working with porcelain, while Pietre Trovanti is dedicated to working with reclaimed stone. Their meeting resulted in Micare Obscuro, where Limoges porcelain and black granite come together to create objects with a strong impact, where lightness and solidity become one.

Image courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

Soft Silence by 9+1

Japanese craftsmanship is not afraid of technology. We can see this very clearly in Soft Silence, a site-specific installation in which 9+1 designers have created lamps made of washi paper (the lightest paper in the world) with a tiny LED inside. An innovative production system similar to 3D printing was developed for this project, in which the still liquid paste is arranged according to a set of data using a programmed plotter.

Images courtesy of Lake Como Design Festival

Onggi by Ye Sul E. Cho

Korean designer and researcher Ye Sul E. Cho has long worked with 3D-printed ceramics. At the Como Festival she presents a series of lightweight vases inspired by traditional forms. Starting with the objects given to newlyweds, vases with rounded shapes representing masculine and feminine forms. The lightness in this case is as much in the form as in the substance, since the designer decided to use as little ceramic as possible, pushing this technique to the limit. 

Images by Paolo Ferrarini

Memento by Philippine Aprile Mandillon

Philippine Aprile Mandillon is an architect, and Memento is her first foray into design. Her studio is dedicated to the restoration of old buildings in France, so she brings familiarity of classical architecture. For this candle series she took architectural elements and extracted, reduced, cut, and mixed them, then transforming them into candles. Light and lightness work in harmony, making us feel the solidity and durability of architecture in a new way.

Image by Paolo Ferrarini

Night and Day by Hana Hillerová

A few years ago Czechoslovakian artist Hana Hillerová decided to move into a new studio house. In her view, light defines the true nature of a home, and she started looking for good lamps. Not satisfied with what she found, she decided to use her skills as a sculptor to make what was in her head, creating the glass lamps of the Night and Day series—objects that change radically and beautifully when turned on or off.

Images by Paolo Ferrarini

Open to the public until 22 September 2024. Further information and tickets are available at Lake Como Design Festival.

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Journey Between Reality and Illusion at Homo Faber

The third edition of this biennale in Venice proves it to be the international benchmark for quality craftsmanship

Paolo Ferrarini

9 September 2024

In its third edition, Homo Faber proves to be the international benchmark for quality craftsmanship. As with its first two editions, this biennial—organized by the Michelangelo Foundation—is being held at the enchanting Giorgio Cini Foundation. This year, artistic direction was deftly handled by director Luca Guadagnino (who concurrently presented his latest film, Queer, at the Venice Film Festival) and architect Nicolò Rosmarini. This year’s theme, The Journey of Life, is explored through 10 installations, ranging from Birth to Afterlife. Further, this year introduces not only European handicrafts but products from all continents. As a result, visitors can admire more than 800 objects made by over 400 artisans from 70 countries, representing 105 different crafts.

Many objects in the exhibition look like one thing, but, in fact, are deceptive. One example is the three-dimensional embroideries of Youmeng Liu, who can recreate everyday foods such as vegetables, ice cream or cake slices—but with a simple thread. During the opening days, the British embroiderer, who is also very popular on Instagram, demonstrated her technique live before visitors’ eyes. Similarly, Julia Obermaier‘s illusions play with everyday life. The erasers she presents at Homo Faber look ready-made but are actually crafted from natural gemstones such as Quartz, Opal, Agate, Lapis lazuli, or resin and pigment.

Throughout, we find classic crafts such as silverware and blown glass, as well as original interpretations of ancient ceramic techniques. The latter describes the work of Claire Lindner, whose glazed stoneware sculptures are reminiscent of soft, floating underwater creatures and time-encrusted surfaces with bright colors that are perfect for the digital world. New York-based artisan Ayako Hirogaki‘s glassware is inspired by the human body and uses an ancient Japanese technique to represent physical and emotional pain. Her sculptures appear to float lightly but are actually solid, complex glass objects.

Manila-based multidisciplinary artist Leeroy New creates intricate masks using all kinds of materials. For Melt Mask, he used elastic silicone that looks like a metamorphosis of a robotic entity, something pretty far from what we’d expect from the tradition of craftsmanship but nevertheless absolutely incredible.

The section of the exhibit dedicated to love is, perhaps unsurprisingly, full of flowers, showcasing crafts such as jewelry and embroidery. The most interesting artifacts, however, are made with unusual materials. Take, for example, the featherworks of Prune Faux, the wax flowers from Mona Oren, the polyester fabric orchids from Permaflora, the silicon bouquets by Gigliola Scagliotti, and the tiny brass daisies by Hyejeong Ko. Each petal is artificial, each leaf is man-made, each flower is an exquisite trompe-l’oeil 

Ceramics also hold many surprises in store at Homo Faber. Philip Kupferschmidt creates functional objects that seem to melt and become imaginary creatures. The effect of Bertozzi & Casoni‘s objects is quite different but just as magical, as ceramics are transformed into still lives full of spoiled food and shattered objects. 

As with previous editions, one can also admire live artisans at work in the exhibition’s main venue. These range from independent workers to employees from great maisons such as Buccellati, Santoni and Lesage. If that were not enough, the Homo Faber in Città circuit allows visitors to discover 70 artisanal workshops across Venice.

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One Day at Ducati in Borgo Panigale, Italy

Exploring the production, design process and strategy behind the famous Italian motorcycle house

Paolo Ferrarini

9 August 2024

Sporty and elegant are two words that come to mind when describing Ducati, the famed Italian motorcycle producer. A legend in its own right, Ducati is a crown jewel in the Motor District, a small region between Bologna and Modena that is also home to Ferrari, Maserati, Lamborghini, Dallara and many more. We had the rare chance to visit them in Borgo Panigale, a small town outside Bologna. During our day of exploration, we witnessed the production process and talked to Ducati CEO, Claudio Domenicali, along with Andrea Ferraresi, Director of Centro Stile Ducati.

Our tour begins in the Museo Ducati, an extensive immersion into the company’s evolution, which started in 1926. Originally a producer of radios, radio parts and condensers, Ducati steadily grew but was then occupied and bombed during World War II. After the war, the company opened a new branch and started the production of Cucciolo, a small engine that could be applied to regular bicycles and make them “motor bikes.” The museum follows the eras of the company, punctuated by constant technological innovations (such as the desmodromic valve) and a high dose of design to be found in models such as Scrambler 450,  750 GT, the ST series, 900 Superlight, Monster, Multistrada and many more.

After, we follow the entire production process (documented in the rarely-seen-before images in this article). Everything starts from the engine. A group of skilled workers carefully build each engine along an assembly line that mixes manual work, robots, craftsmanship and high-tech processes. Then, the finished engines get tested and move to the next phase, where the vehicle takes shape. It’s fascinating to observe how many workers move around these design marvels, quickly building the motorcycle in a highly rehearsed choreography. 

In addition to their regular production, Ducati recently launched Unica, a highly personalized customization program. We explore the initiative with Ferraresi while inside the Centro Stile, where pictures are not allowed, and for obvious reasons, many areas are not accessible to visitors—not even the most elite clients.

“Unica was born almost as a joke here at the Centro Stile,” Ferraresi says. “At first there were few customers, but by word of mouth they increased.” The design team at Unica is comprised of the same people who design all other motorcycles. “With Unica, we work mostly on graphics, liveries and materials. Some people put their own name, their own symbol, their own logo, their own machine colors, and their own company colors. Then there are also accessories that one can add.”

Making a Ducati Unica involves a holistic experience of the Ducati world. “The customers come here and develop their ideas with the designers,” Ferraresi says. “They often come several times to see the various steps of creating their own bike. It’s nice for them to come to Borgo Panigale, visit the museum and see the production. It’s a complete experience that goes beyond just buying an object.”

Ferraresi adds, “You always try to indulge [the client], but it still has to be a Ducati in the end.” The borders that distinguish Ducati’s design are well defined. “Authenticity, essentiality, compactness, sensuality, sportiness, recognizability: you have to see the bike, and you have to say ‘this is a Ducati’ even without seeing the logo.”

Design goes hand-in-hand with long-term vision, elements under the control of Domenicali, a veteran of the sector who has worked at Ducati for decades. Our chat begins with the company’s fundamental values: “We think of Ducati as a magical fusion of sensual beauty and sophisticated technology,” he says. “Style is so important that it is our first value. Then sophistication and performance follow, within which technology is blended. One of our founding elements is the combination of emotion generated by forms and emotion generated by use.”

Ducati is one of the leading companies in the Motor Valley, and Domenicali is aware of how relevant the district is. “There are no other similar districts in the world. England has a Formula 1 district, but the Motor Valley is just a unique place. The districts all have the same characteristics: there are parent companies, which start first, then other companies are formed, and there is fertilization. The Motor Valley has these exchanges of people, and local education in universities is linked to companies. We have MUNER – Motorvehicle University of Emilia-Romagna. This synergy between training, companies and public administration is fundamental. We also have the Motor Valley Fest and the Motor Valley Accelerator, the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Imola, the MotoGP Grand Prix and the Superbike Grand Prix in Misano. This allows us to have companies united by this positioning between technology and beauty.”

As for where Ducati is going, Domenicali says, “We certainly don’t want to enter the world of mobility utilities such as scooters. We don’t want to enter the world of small displacement, whereas almost every other manufacturer has decided to offer smaller products. We have decided to keep a company that is smaller in volume and higher in product range. That is also why we are going decisively into the customization world with Unica.”

Domenicali is already enacting future-forward step for Ducati. “We are evolving the company’s digital systems to ensure that we have a much greater ability to customize motorcycles through digital configuration that the customer will do in the United States, Japan or Berlin. We will assemble motorcycles that will be very different from each other. We will have a wider range of colors, materials and rims to ensure that we have more extreme customization aimed at audiences that we are trying to select and educate, who are increasingly able to appreciate the special component, the special material. We will never give up these soft surfaces and this elegant sportiness, the balance that when you see it is clearly a Ducati, even without seeing the brand.”

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“Louise Bourgeois. Unconscious Memories” at Galleria Borghese in Rome

A sensational new exhibition creates a dialogue about memory, between baroque masterpieces and contemporary art

Paolo Ferrarini

1 July 2024

The contrast between historic and contemporary art tends to be evocative. Sometimes, it creates meaning that helps to better understand both eras—as with the current exhibition “Louise Bourgeois. Unconscious Memories” in the rooms and gardens of the magnificent Galleria Borghese in Rome.

After Galleria Borghese hosted exhibitions dedicated to Azzedine Alaïa, Damien Hirst, Giuseppe Penone, Francis Bacon, Georg Baselitz and so many others, Louise Bourgeois marks the first monographic exhibition of a female artist at the gallery. And it is undoubtedly one of the best held in these halls.

Twenty of Bourgeois’ works inhabit the institution, where one can admire the best of her work, centered around themes such as metamorphosis, gender identity, trauma, dreams, and individual and collective memory. Her acclaimed spiders, the cells, fabric heads and marble sculptures are all present. The works appear in contrast alongside Bernini and Canova sculptures, Raphael and Titian paintings, and frescoed ceilings by Mariano Rossi and Domenico de Angelis.

Geraldine Leardi, co-curator of the exhibition with Philip Larratt-Smith and Cloé Perrone, explains, “This exhibition was conceived to talk about memory. The Galleria Borghese is the custodian of the memories of Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the founder, and Prince Marcantonio IV Borghese, who completely remade it in the second half of the 18th century. The theme of memory was a very sensitive one for Louise Bourgeois, so this could have been the common thread linking the will of the gallery’s first patrons. The gallery was born as a place of representation to show the extraordinariness and wonder of the collection. In this case, memory was an individual element that immediately translated into a collective sharing with the community. The patrons assembled a collection that entered the collective memory and is still built today.” 

The memory of the place meets the memory of the artist in this exhibition. “Luise Bourgeois, on the other hand, is the bearer of a highly individual memory that she cultivates and sublimates through her production, especially with cells. But beware, individual memory becomes collective the moment it is shown, so it is a kaleidoscope of possible relationships between the concept of collective memory and the concept of individual memory that are traced starting with the gallery and ending with Louis Bourgeois,” Leardi says.

In addition to the unconscious aspects, there are the conscious ones. Perhaps memory is more related to the Borghese Gallery, and the “unconscious” part is more typical of Bourgeois. Leardi points out that “both are partakers of both aspects, in different manners and with different intensity. For example, ‘Cell (The Last Climb),’ with its blue glass spheres, is the work in which she declares an ascent to transcendence, a form of abandonment of material works. The message is not at all unconscious; it is evident. There is a spiral staircase going up; in my opinion, it is almost a testament. It was first shown in 2008 when she was 97 years old. She was near the end of her life, so it’s a statement, a manifesto, not at all unconscious.”

The spiral staircase in the center of the work converses perfectly with Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s “Apollo and Daphne,” “Rape of Proserpine,” and “David,” works that are among the most admired in the entire museum. It is no coincidence that Bourgeois herself visited this building in 1967 and was fascinated, as she wrote in her travel notes, “The city is a mess of every single historical period piled one atop the other right in the center of town. Fantastic! (…) for the Villa Borghese, I spent the afternoon there, both in the gardens and inside. It was wonderful. It is a dream, 6 Berninis.”

Leardi provided specific guidance about why some works were placed inside, and others outside the palace. “In some cases, it makes sense to create a dialogue; in others, it does not. For example, ‘Cell (The Last Climb)’ is set up inside the highest, largest, most important hall of the gallery; it is a work that has to be seen first because of its symbolic significance; it has a centrality in the overall idea of the exhibition, so it has to be displayed in the central place of the museum. The ‘Untitled Heads’ are displayed in the Hall of Emperors. They are made from fabric fragments that came largely from the workshops of her parents, who were tapestry restorers. They have been placed on porphyry tables and flank the busts with the heads of the emperors. There is no mimetic research. However, there is a desire for comparison between the twentieth-century and the seventeenth-century imperial heads that emulate the ancient,” she says.

During a visit, every time one encounters a Bourgeois work, it is a discovery of amazement. Leardi also had a few little surprises during the installation. “I love stones very much, and I must say I was struck by the granites on which ‘The Welcoming Hands,’ casts of Louise Bourgeois and Jerry Gorovoy’s bronze hands, are lying. I don’t know if this is correct from the point of view of Bourgeois’ intention. Still, I associated the granite bases that make me think of rootedness and the thin, slender bronze hands that reflect feelings of belonging, home, and friendship,” she adds.

Leardi also voiced that she would dream of keeping one Bourgeois work at Galleria Borghese. “I would keep the spider in the Giardino della Meridiana,” she says, “because it is a spider that wants to escape. It’s not a static spider. It’s a fleeing spider; it’s not happy to be there, and I must say it’s beautiful. The heads in the Salone degli Imperatori are also magnificent, but I would not keep them. The spider, we would keep it.”

The exhibition “Louise Bourgeois. Unconscious Memories” will be open to the public until 15 September 2024. Reservations are essential. 

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Discovering Rossinavi’s Seawolf X Superyacht

Design, sustainability and technology meet in this stunning new luxury catamaran

Paolo Ferrarini

28 June 2024

If superyachts were clothes Rossinavi would be a haute-couture atelier. The Italian shipyard makes only fully custom boats, with great attention to design and environmental issues. Their latest marvel, the M/Y Seawolf X, is a hybrid-electric catamaran that pushes the boundaries of design and technology. Designed by Fulvio de Simoni, with interiors by the New York-based architecture firm Meyer Davis Studio, it’s a testament to Rossinavi’s commitment to innovation, design and luxury. Visiting the boatyard and meeting its people gives a real sense of passion and commitment. It also unveils a point of view on luxury based on a deep knowledge of the sector and an original vision for its future.

Sustainability is also a crucial element at Rossinavi, as demonstrated by BluE, their advanced eco-friendly boating technology, which is featured on the new M/Y Seawolf X. This technology gets inspiration from phytoplankton, a form of sea life that generates oxygen using solar energy and produces bioluminescence at night. This natural process inspired a hybrid-electric boating platform that stores solar energy during the day to power navigation free from noises, odors and emissions.

Needless to say, in luxury, the preservation of nature should go hand in hand with pleasure. That’s why BluE uses solar panels to capture and convert sunlight into energy, optimizing performance and enhancing the experience, for example drastically reducing the noise of the engines. It enables full-electric cruising for daily use and up to 80% energy autonomy on transatlantic journeys, with minimal reliance on diesel-electric mode, which is still necessary but substantially reduced. Further, an onboard AI system enhances the experience by monitoring habits, suggesting energy-saving behaviors and providing information about the surroundings. 

Rossinavi uses design and tech to fully customize each superyacht to meet the owner’s needs. Simoni‘s catamaran design for the Seawolf X is based on curved yet sharp lines, evident from the side, where two arches intersect forming a sort of infinite loop. One particularly challenging step was hiding the solar panels that are perfectly integrated with the surfaces.

For anyone interested, it will be possible to admire Rossinavi’s Seawolf X catamaran in Monte Carlo for the Monaco Yacht Show in September.

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The History of Printed Fabrics in Two Splendid Volumes

Taschen’s “The Book of Printed Fabrics” presents the incredible collection of the Musée de l’Impression sur étoffes in Mulhouse, France

Paolo Ferrarini

20 June 2024

Some books are not just volumes to be read and collected but objects to be preserved and handed down. Taschen’s “The Book of Printed Fabrics. From the 16th century until today” is a rare gem, a unique category in its own right, offering a privileged glimpse into the world of printed fabrics.

This impressive work presents the globally significant collection of the Musée de l’Impression sur étoffes (The Museum of Printed Fabrics) located in Mulhouse, France—on the border of Germany and Switzerland. The museum, born in the 1800s, is a testament to the prosperous fabric printing industry, and includes contributions from four continents to create the world’s most important collection of printed textiles.

Taschen’s mammoth work, meticulously assembled by the book’s author, Aziza Gril-Mariotte, presents an impressive roundup of about 900 images in two volumes across a total of 888 pages. These are accompanied by English, French and German texts, ensuring a comprehensive and enriching reading and research experience.

The first volume covers international designs; this includes Indian textiles, and Japanese ones. In addition to floral patterns, the book illustrates abstract designs, from classic paisleys to sophisticated batik-inspired gradients. Fascinating is the section dedicated to how the industrialization of the printing processes influenced fabric design.

The second volume showcases the technique and creativity achieved by fabric producers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Some designs, colors and methods seem utterly contemporary, but surprisingly, they date back one hundred years or more. This is the case with the Ground Patterns designed by Mizzi Ebert and Adele Bettelheim in 1904 as well as dress fabric samples from 1880. Despite being analog, they look and feel like the product of a digital age.

The book is available for pre-order at Taschen’s online store for 200 USD.

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Discovering the Six Senses Rome with Patricia Urquiola

The acclaimed Spanish architect tells us how the luxury hospitality brand’s first urban resort was born

Paolo Ferrarini

22 May 2024

Many hotels strive to develop an environment that feels like home. And yet, something different happens with the Six Senses Rome. Guests feel elsewhere, far away, on vacation. This counters the fact that it’s the luxury hospitality brand’s first urban resort—the only one that is not an exotic place like Ibiza, the Maldives, the Red Sea or Fiji, but in the heart of a city. It couldn’t be more centrally located, as the Colosseum, Trevi Fountain and Forums are just a few minutes walk away. But it couldn’t be farther away from the idea of a city, as silence, relaxation and well-being reign throughout this Six Senses, as they do at all their other resorts. 

The hotel opened in early 2023, and designer Patricia Urquiola was entrusted with the renovation project. The location is the majestic Palazzo Salviati Cesi Mellini, built in 1480 and constantly modified in the following centuries. It has housed private residencies, a cinema and, in the 1970s, became a bank designed by architect Ludovico Quaroni. 

We spoke with Urquiola about the path she took to get there. “It was supposed to be a kind of oasis, a place to unite human and nature. It’s a formula that Six Senses is investigating, starting with resorts, but they don’t know how to approach it in an urban dimension yet,” she says. Starting in Rome was not an obvious choice, especially as it is a layered, busy and often chaotic urban center. Urquiola confirms that, “Rome is very complex, but this building also has its own complexity; it’s like a Rome within Rome. I tried to work with the pure forms and volumes of Quaroni and older elements. We recovered the 16th-century staircases and restored Quaroni’s spectacular circular staircase. We enhanced a coherence that the building already possessed.”

Urquiola’s intervention optimized and connected the spaces but also radically updated the surfaces. Now, the protagonists are the neutral tones of the walls and floors, the vibrant colors of art and design objects, accompanied by natural light and lots of vegetation. We notice how carefully she chose natural wood and raw fabrics in the rooms, walls in “opus signum” (an ancient technique dating back to Roman antiquity), lots of curved surfaces and upholstery everywhere. Silence and serenity are the hallmarks of everything that happens in these spaces. The result is a luxury that is perceived but not overt. This informs the rooftop, a magnificent terrace with the best views of Rome, where guests are surrounded by herbs that will be used in the restaurant and cocktail bar.

The Six Senses Rome also includes a sophisticated beauty center and a spa open to hotel guests and outside visitors. They organize evenings of relaxation and wellness, as well as yoga and meditation classes, updating the ancient Roman tradition of “salus per aquam” with contemporary technology such as biohacking. In Urquiola’s words, “We wanted a spa with an immaculate architectural note. They wanted to give the water a stark continuity, especially transitioning from hot to cold areas. When you enter this space, in the first room there are herbs in a kind of small laboratory called Alchemy Bar. Then you go down to the wet part, where you get in touch with nature. That’s why we wanted to sculpt the surfaces with laurel leaves, starting from the myth of Apollo and Daphne. The walls of the wellness center are made of concrete with inserts of real laurel leaves, which have thus left their indelible mark.”

Urquiola’s love of experimentation is also expressed through new ideas of luxury. “With Six Senses, it was possible to experiment with creating a new sense of quality, which goes beyond the concept of luxury,” she says. “The idea of an urban resort is meant to give a wellness service, which actually comes before exclusivity. We put quality and inclusiveness at the center because we want the spa to be for the city of Rome, not just the hotel.”

Altogether, it is a new experience for Rome—one of well-being and relaxation. “Another thing that is very important to me is that the hotel has to be a happy place, not a domestic space,” Urquiola adds. “You see that in the 96 rooms and suites. We took out everything that was not essential and left a lot of voids. We want a more thought-out, more adult, almost disguised luxury that speaks of the highest quality.”

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Thematic Highlights from the 60th Venice Biennale

Entitled “Stranieri Ovunque — Foreigners Everywhere,” the spectacular occasion takes art lovers on a journey beyond expectation

Paolo Ferrarini

30 April 2024

Questions of identity—strangers, outsiders, distances and societal differences—are all variables of “Stranieri Ovunque — Foreigners Everywhere,” the 60th International Art Exhibition, which recently opened in Venice to throngs of contemporary art lovers.  

For this year’s Biennale, Brazilian curator Adriano Pedrosa has chosen over 300 artists, many of whom were born in the southern hemisphere and tend to work far from their home countries. Browsing through the two sections, Arsenale and Giardini, visitors face art that—in accordance with the theme—quickly makes them feel estranged.

A praise of imperfection was observed throughout the biennale, binding many works. In an age where so much art is polished to perfection, this Biennale avoided artificial intelligence, filters and over-editing almost entirely. Given the strong presence of embroidery, weaving, collage, mosaic and patchwork, the surfaces were often uneven and rough. Not only was fabric the most recurrent material, but paintings were often rudimentary with added elements like recycled materials.

Artist Pacita Abad was born in the Philippines and her work is a perfect example of such an approach. In “Filipinas in Hong Kong” (1995) she represents life in a modern city through a mixture of quilt, trapunto and painting. Textile is also the choice of Palestinian-Saudi artist Dana Awartani with “Come, Let Me Heal Your Wounds. Let Me Mend Your Broken Bones” (2024), an ongoing series of colorful fabric panels documenting the war in Gaza. Awartani cuts the fabric to mark deaths and bombings and then mends the holes. Historical amnesia and the role of women are at the center of Giulia Andreani’s “La scuola di taglio e cucito” (2023) paintings. The artist reproduces and reinterprets historical pictures of suffragettes, aiming to represent a fading memory on a monumental, monochromatic watercolor on paper.

The Modernism that Pedros centered as curator is not that of European or Western tradition but that of South America, Africa and Asia. The featured artists—well-known in their home nations, and only sometimes internationally—initiate the most exciting sense of discovery of this edition. One example is lone Saldanha and the installation featuring 35 of her signature “Bambus” from the ’60s and ’70s. Her process is almost like a performance, where she grows plants that are dried for over a year, then sanded, prepared with a white base five times and then painted.

Pedros also curated a lot of queer-themed art, demonstrating that being a foreigner today does not only mean geographically but also socially. The artist Omar Mismar works at the crossroads between art, politics and the aesthetics of disaster. His mosaic “Two Unidentified Lovers in a Mirror” (2023) resembles an ancient relic from his native Lebanon and yet it’s a contemporary scene where the faces of the two male lovers are pixelated (done by scrambling the tiles). Paintings by Louis Fratino depict queer daily life, from private environments to gay clubs. In Fratino’s work, it’s easy to uncover references to painters such as Pablo Picasso and Paul Cézanne.

Technology did manifest through the Biennale but it was not central to Pedrosa’s vision. That’s why works like those of WangShui feel alien but, at the same time, mark important visual and conceptual passages. The American artist placed aluminum panels against the windows at Arsenale, next to a multichannel video sculpture that simulates the movement of a monstrous snake. Though this work is eye-catching, technology does not only appear as special effects; sometimes, it’s channeled through sometimes as simple as a neon sign and a powerful message. This is the case of the collective Claire Fontaine, whose work actually inspired the International Art Exhibition’s theme. Their installation “Foreigners Everywhere” (2004-2024) is at the entrance of the main pavilion at Giardini, in the first room at Arsenale, next to the Italian Pavilion. It features the same sentence in many languages—and is both the perfect opening for this year’s art Biennale and the perfect conclusion.

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Discovering Salvatori and The Carrara Marble Quarries

Our visit to the Tuscan marble district with Gabriele Salvatori

Paolo Ferrarini

13 February 2024

As a material, marble has defined architecture and design, art forms and historic periods. We stepped into this world first-hand when we visited the Carrara marble quarries, the surrounding Tuscan lands, and the Salvatori company. Guido Salvatori founded his namesake company in 1946 in the small town of Querceta, a few kilometers from the Northern Tuscan coast and not far from the world-famous Carrara quarries. Salvatori is now run by third-generation family members who have transformed the company from a small local business into a flourishing internationally-renowned brand, recognized for its love for craftsmanship, its close relationship with design and experimentation around innovative processes.

Salvatori’s elective materials are natural stones and marbles, including Bianco Carrara, Gris du Marais and limestone. The brand focuses on a small color palette that ranges from white to black, cream, light gray and dark gray. This is mainly for a technical reason: these materials withstand processing under blades, a technology that distinguishes the company from peers. That said, Salvatori also produces small, colorful objects, such as the photo frames and vases of the new Precioso collection by American designer Stephen Burks.

CEO Gabriele Salvatori loves design, as demonstrated by the Burks collaboration, as well as partnerships with Michael Anastassiades, Kengo Kuma, Piero Lissoni, John Pawson, Yabu Pushelberg, Patricia Urquiola, Vincent Van Duysen and many more. 

“A beautiful project originates from a great designer sitting at the same table alongside a great craftsman,” Salvatori tells us. “The craftsman puts the experience on the plate, and the designer brings a naive, unpolluted eye that helps you look sideways. It comes as if the designer were a child who turned things upside down.”

Color and collaboration aside, Salvatori’s specialty is the processing of white Carrara marble. To reach the quarries, we venture onto dirt roads full of curves, stones and white dust. Once at the top, we are captured by the majesty of the Apuan Alps mountain range and the centuries-old work that dug them. Their intrinsic value is such that, since 2011, the Tuscan Mining Park has been part of the UNESCO Global Geopark network. That’s not to mention all the Renaissance sculpture masterpieces that were made with this marble, and the great artists that we all know came here in person to choose the best blocks. Today, this work is coordinated by a consortium and carried out in 150 quarries by skilled workers who work with gigantic machinery as well as their bare hands.

White marble is primarily mainly for sculpture and architecture but has several other usages. It is, in fact, a very precious material made up of 95% calcium carbonate. It is expensive, porous and easy to work with; it is used for cosmetics, toothpaste, paint and even dietary supplements. We ask our guide if the material that is likely to run out. “I don’t think so,” he tells us, “we are digging at over 1000 meters above sea level, but below us, the marble reaches up to three kilometers below sea level. Since the ancient Roman times, we have only scratched the surface.”

Back at the Salvatori factory, we visit production. Here, we observe the many steps that are meticulously executed by hand. The colors of the stones, which may seem the same to an inexperienced eye, actually have variations in hue. For large orders, it becomes necessary to maintain a uniformity of color, and until now, only human experience allowed this.

Salvatori says this may change. “For the white Carrara, one of our specialized craftsmen comes to make 23 to 24 choices of tones with their naked eye. We are nerds, but after eight hours of this work, even the human eye goes haywire. This is why we have been studying AI for years and, in recent times, also generative AI. This is a passion of mine,” he says.

Neural networks can also come in handy in the design process of a traditional material. “We also know Midjourney well, but it’s the tip of the iceberg,” Salvatori says. “I don’t want to tell you that AI will draw me the next texture, but it will give me a great hand in visualizing an idea without wasting time and material for prototyping. Maybe it can give me some ideas, like that ‘looking sideways’ that maybe will make me find something that I like that we can then develop.”