Laguna

The flora is wild and thick in the Brenta river and its tributaries, fresh waters which flow quickly towards the Venetian lagoon almost as if they were a hurry to become brackish. And it is with the clay worked in the area around Brenta – and more specifically the artistic ceramics area of Nove, in the province of Vicenza – which the Laguna table ceramics collection is made.

Each component reproduces, through a fresh and unexpected approach to scientific illustration, details of 18th-century etchings with lagoon seaweed: a tough, obstinate vegetation which learned to adapt to the changes of the tides and salty winds. The decorations – dark chocolate colour on a warm white background – are created with a transfer printing process combined with hand-painted elements.

The Inspiration

/La-gù-na/ Between the mouths of the Piave and Brenta rivers lies the Venetian lagoon, a place of transition between the sea, land and sky which is continually changing. An environment forged by the sea currents and river flow, to which the hand of man has harmoniously added new canals and river banks. A place with ephemeral surroundings, whose tenacious vegetation is reflected in the fresh- and salt-water basins.

The Designer

Eyes open to the present, in search of a new and light aesthetic in order to dream up the forms of the future. A work suspended between artisan uniqueness and industrial precision, ancient manual printing techniques and pantograph engraving, lines which are skilfully combined with unpredictable irregularities and asymmetries. Because it is in these differences which the design idea is instilled, creative chemistry which generates the impalpable emotion radiated by the objects. Day-to-day objects, which with the addition of a touch of poetry become the protagonists of new rituals, able to transform into small moments of ordinary joy.

The Craftsman

"The slow pace of our artisan work is our source of satisfaction". Here, in this workshop in Nove, we see precisely that: classical music in the background, the rustling sound of a stream, the symphonies of those who sing while they paint, and then the alchemy of the clay and its colours taking shape.

But the work of a ceramist is tough, as well. A certain strength is required, and those employed in this workshop are proud enough not to seek the uniform perfection of industrial products, but the character and beauty which only experience and a craftsman's hands can impress on those ceramics.