Category: Aziende

There are 16 posts published under Aziende.

The table Alpey and the Briccole of Venice

The Venice lagoon is dotted with large poles that, in groups of threes, indicate the waterways within which the depth of water is that it can be navigable at low tide.
These are the so-called Briccole.

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Periodically, the Briccole are replaced due to wear or breakage. From the recovery of these poles you get an oak wood with unique characteristics, the nature it draws the grain through the shellfish that have left their mark their passage through the water that penetrates into the material and then evaporates. The prolonged contact with water gives a solid color and a unique and distinctive.

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venezia+briccola - Copia

Is to Briccole that the designer Marco Pieri was inspired to drow the table Alpey, is wood obtained from Briccole we thought to make it happen.

Table-B Table-B2 8780_376518919109045_990853564_n Table-A2 Table-B3 Table-A Table-A3 483503_376519942442276_1236797803_n

261513_376473859113551_132235308_nDiscover more about Samarreda

 

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Custom Made Products – Pratomarmi

fontana in cardoso grezzo prato marmi

What kind of products can we produce? Everything people ask.
For us craftsmanship means to do a very nice job with skill, doing unique pieces in small series to realize desires of our clients.

prato marmi

This doesn’t mean that we should not research or propose new materials or small products that are unique. The study of new technologies as “touch” and the collaboration with some universities is leading to the creation of a range of innovative products and designs but… for this we will talk on the next post …

BRECCIA MEDICEA prato marmi Breccia medicea CALACATTA DELLA GHERARDESCA prato marmi Calacatta della Gherardesca CALACATTA PERSICHINO prato marmi

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Contemporary style Chess / Backgammon set – Italfama

Beech table turned and disassembled in three pieces (base, leg, top)
Sizes: ht 68cm Top 58cm x 58cm chess board square 5 cm
Chess Board and Backgammon made briar wood completely hand inlaid
Checkers for backgammon (32 pieces) are made in solid brass
Chess set made in solid brass turned and hand brushed, King size: ht 11,5cm base diameter 3.5 cm

italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally  italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally

 

italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally

italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally

italfama chess backgammon set schacchi made in itally

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Three stories about Crystal – Nuova CEV

What’s more common than a football, the ball of a sport that we could call “global”? That’s why in 1990 we made a series of gadgets for the World Cup Italia 90 bearing the legendary tricolour “Ciao”.

Nuova CEV italia 90 crystal

Trick or treat? Trick! That’s why a playful glassmaker started to make small stones as a way of adding life to breakfast time, the famous “Fresca” (a moment of refreshment)! And a prestigious designer has made a series of chandeliers and lamps out of them.

nuova cev crystal

Television, such a passion! During an interview on Telemontecarlo I took a gift to the anchorwoman, a crystal ring, and from that time on I have been coerced into replicating and multiplying these gifts for various actresses.

nuova cev crystal

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Inspiration – Pratomarmi

Living in Tuscany, walking in a city like Florence or in the countryside is a way to relax and see all the little things that make a difference. Nature and historical cities are really an inspiration for us.

toscana It’s a joy and an inspiration that we collect to think about our works.

palazzo vecchio Piazza_san_giovanni_da_via_cerretani,_firenze Discover more about Pratomarmi

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Tuscany – Quota Collection

Tuscany, our territory.
Very rich in history, art, culture, creativity and “ability to make”.

toscana collina

Its lifestyle is permeated with strong traditions and also a strong sense of belonging to Tuscan community.

palio siena campo siena palazzo

With a unique landscape with its typical colors and signs. With its quality of life and its ecosystem known and appreciated worldwide.

san gimignano

Unique source of inspiration for our work and to transfer good taste, elegance and balance to our products. In addition fantastic handicraft know-how and passion for details.

poltrona quota collection

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Customized design – Samarreda

Which are the products of Samarreda?
All those who can meet the demands of its customers.

Self Habitat Firenze Samarreda

Samarreda customer service is oriented to custom made, or the realization to measure and bespoke, tailoring its production according to the demands and needs of furniture of the customer. The customer has the opportunity to choose among a variety of materials, from the stones, metals, wood in the variants of all possible finishes.

Since April 2015 you can visit Samarreda showroom, at Self Habitat shop in Florence, where the design of the author meets with the custom made.

Self Habitat Firenze Samarreda

It will therefore be possible to have a point of reference in Florence for every kind of furniture that is dictated by the desire to be able to choose according to their own way of living the home and work, finding an availability to the project, the board or at the second their needs for taste and service.

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Gallo – From Venice to Tuscany

How and when was the company founded?
The Gallo Company has a long tradition as it was founded in Venice in 1910.

gallo company venice venezia
Following centuries of Italian tradition associated with craftsmanship, the founder of the company, Luciano Gallo, started his own activity in the solitude of a small workshop located in the heart of Venice, precisely in Campo San Tomà, one of the hundreds of small squares that compose the uneven and jagged urban area of the city of Venice.
So we are talking of 105 years, but do not ask me if we celebrated the anniversary because we did not: as a rationalist, I suffer from a strange form of superstition!

gallo company toscana

So the origins are in Veneto?
Actually I prefer to say they are in Venice.

What exactly did your great-grandfather?
Although the most typical Venetian artisan tradition is linked to glass, Luciano Gallo was an expert in processing iron and more specifically in making lighting objects for outside use such as lanterns or oil lamps, as shown in the photo on the cover page of our catalogue, in which he can be seen amidst his creations.

gallo company in venice

How did he end up in Tuscany?
Because of the war – after WW1, in 1919, my great-grandfather moved to Tuscany, first to Florence then to Prato (8 km from Florence) with his large family (his wife and 9 children, i.e. 7 sons and 2 daughters) as was usual in those days.

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The move was necessary because the region of “Tre Venetie” was the Italian front of the First World War, and was devastated in the aftermath. And then who knows: it might be destiny, I wonder? A Venetian artisan who does not work with glass but with bronze and wrought iron ends up in the right place after all, Florence, the Italian land of artistic wrought iron crafts, as is the whole Tuscany region.

It is this very activity, after the move to Prato, that lead him to become a famous “bronze” craftsman in the Florence area, a creator of artistic objects, including for the street furniture sector, such as park benches, street lamps and statues in brass and bronze.
Luciano Gallo passed away in 1933 (not a bad year to leave this world, I reckon!: Hitler’s rise to power in Germany and all the mess that he’ll make afterwards, but this is another story…)

Who continues the activity?
Being able to rely on 9 children, 7 of whom sons, the company did not end with Luciano. Two Gallo brothers, Libero and Dino (my grandfather) took over the business after a forced interruption during the most dramatic phase of WW2, due to the German occupation between 1943 and 1945.

Dino Gallo
1945 is also the year when Aldo Gallo was born, Dino’s son and my father.

Aldo Gallo

We have lost count now – which generation is that?
Third – Aldo is the third generation – not bad I’d say: having lived through two wars, a dictatorship… so we are now in the 1950’s.

And what happened in the 1950’s?
The brothers Libero and Dino Gallo went their separate ways but continued to produce classic-decorative light fittings for internal use. Over those years, each one in his own way, they renewed and reinterpreted the so-called “Florentine style” (which in its most traditional form consists of either iron or wood) and brought some major stylistic innovation such as the use of Venetian and Murano crystal and glass (recalling their Venetian origins).
Both Gallo brothers (Dino and Libero) were really two master craftsmen and guides, in the Florence area, also for all subsequent generations of classic lighting producers over the course of the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.

It was a good time – full economic boom – how did the company live through it?
Rather well: over the course of the 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s, my father Aldo brought major innovative changed in style and production that lead him to introduce new work processes: not only the use of iron, but also products based on the use of wood, ceramics and china. This further lead him, in particular in the 1970’s, to invent a collection of table lamps that became a commercial and stylistic case in the recent story of the Italian decorative lighting design.

Over the 80’s and 90’s, my father Aldo found new energy and incentive also thanks to the constant and keen presence of his wife and business partner, Beatrice Pacini Gallo, my mother.

Beatrice Pacini Gallo

Thus the company was able to complete its final leap in terms of quality and recognition on foreign markets, including outside Europe (Asia, North America, the Arab Countries).

And you Jacopo, what are your achievements?
To begin with, I was born – in 1972 – and so I represent the fourth generation and I truly hope not to be the last.

Jacopo Gallo

You can well vouch for it after 105 years!
That’s right – we look pretty good for our age!
A century and more of experience is a treasure on which to draw – a cushion on which to sit: artisan background that happily combines iron, glass, wood, bronze and ceramics, as well as a cultural background since I grew up in close contact with a Venetian grandfather who would always crack jokes with me in Venetian dialect (a dialect which in some ways we have kept alive at home, joking with my father). I am also the bearer of a Venetian life style, food wise for instance, (we used to eat “poenta e osei” for Sunday lunch, and I’ m still fond of it, as well as liver with onions of course – what memories!).

This constructive contamination may well be what has allowed us to hand down these skills for more than 100 years; then an innate curiosity and the blending of 2 exceptional cultures and territories that belong to 2 dream cities, Florence and Venice.

Sunset in FlorenceFlorence

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Venice

What was your main objective when you joined the company?
To continue the internationalization process that was started in the 1980’s and 90’s and to expand it to what I like to call the emerging “New World”, namely BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China). This coincided with the time when I joined the company for good, in 2000 (while I was finishing my degree in Architecture in Florence). These emerging countries are very important as they have practically sustained world economy over the last 15 years, so we have invested accordingly there with substantial outcome.

What about the future?
The future of a company like ours will always go hand in hand with a review of the past. This is not a “nostalgic” idea, also because it would be impossible to remain attached to old models when the world order changes every 7-10 years; so we are forced to reinvent and question ourselves – here I am referring not so much to work processes but to the spirit behind them.

To this day we continue designing and producing our items in the name of the tradition that has guided our company through over 100 years and 4 generations. The rich cultural background that has been handed down to me helps me monitor, manage and blend different types of materials and shapes, as clearly shown in our production, which is both a review and an update of the already mentioned “Florentine style”.

105 years of existence are also a clear indication of reliability and professionalism that the various owners have always endeavoured to maintain and foster at large, but also toward their many employees, suppliers and customers over the course of 4 generations.

As a matter of fact our company collaborates with hundreds of architects and interior designers all over the world. They have total trust in our abilities and skills, so much so that they very often order made-to-measure or enlarged items, because they are confident that the final result and object that will be delivered will fully meet the expectations of their final customers.

Therefore the “tailor made” approach stands as the most significant step in connection with the review of the past I was mentioning above: i.e. putting our experience at the service of other people’s needs.

gallo company

 

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Quality in every style – New Design Porte

Telling the origin of the inspiration that gives birth of New Design products means telling the story of Lorenzo Cortigiani, the company’s founder.

New Design PorteLorenzo, very young, began working alongside the most important furniture manufacturers in the Chianti. This first important work experience then accompanied him throughout his life, affecting his taste and leaving in him the desire to create not only internal doors that divides spaces of a house but real pieces of furniture that can transform the entire surrounding.

New Design Porte

From the world of furniture in fact derive a passion for details and rich finishes, attention to detail, interest in sinuous shapes and curves.

All most representative models of New Design have their strength in those details that come from the world of furniture, such as carving, rich finishings, precious touch such as the use of gold leaf and the use of noble essences.

New Design Porte

The initial step was to transfer the great Tuscan tradition of Arte Povera; a very simple but refined taste and high quality; suited to the typical rustic and welcoming atmosphere of Tuscany.

The discovery of new markets and an openness to a different clientele over the years led him to seek inspiration continues in all the most significant places that he had the opportunity to visit.

New Design Porte

After some years Lorenzo Cortigiani fulfilled his goal being able to support the traditional production of doors with the production of furniture of the highest level supported by those same craftsmen that taught him the love of wood.

But the goal of the New Design, over the years, has always remained the same: to get the highest possible level of quality in every style, in every finish and in every detail.

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