Raw materials: metals in furnishing

Fantin partnered with Moroso to make Olafur Eliasson’s Secret Cubic Shelves, presented at the recent “Supersalone” and developed out of the Green Light – An Artistic Workshop installation at the 2017 Venice Biennale. The Danish-Icelandic artist has long focused on resources in his research. In this new edition, the bookcase is made entirely from recycled and recyclable steel, with a non-toxic powder coating.

Aluminium is another metal that can be melted down and reused indefinitely, as US company Emeco is well aware: “It’s super-strong, light and fireproof. It is also non-corrosive, non-magnetic and non-bacterial. Little wonder, it was chosen for the 1006 Navy Chair in 1944 [ed. the chair for U.S. Navy ships manufactured by the company]. Aluminium can be indefinitely recycled. Most of the aluminium produced in the late 1800s is still in use today in cans, pans, computer parts and golf clubs. And, yes, in our chairs too,” we read on the company’s website. Emeco’s latest products to showcase the metal’s qualities include the Za stool designed by Naoto Fukasawa, available in anodized, brushed, and powder-coated finishes. Latteria is an aluminium stool designed by Keiji Takeuchi for Fucina, a brand created as part of Lidi, a company based in Desio (Monza Brianza) that for more than fifty years has worked on facades, stairs, and steel, aluminium and other metal frames; the stool is milled out of a single block of 5 cm-thick aluminium.

Jasper Morrison’s stacking Plato chair for Magis is made out of an aluminium section with a die-cast aluminium seat. Francesco Faccin’s Harvey for Et. Al, an evolution of the Metalmobil brand, is an aluminium top mounted on two electrified, tubular, steel trestles equipped with fixing brackets.

“Aluminium and steel have long since fully earned their place in the home and at community venues,” says Albino Celato, Managing Director of the Crocetta del Montello (Treviso) company which transforms metals into surfaces and furniture collections. “These metals’ characteristics are widely-appreciated; they have struck a particular chord in the world of industrial and artistic design. Perhaps due to a resurgence in decor, in recent years, we have experienced a rise in demand for brass and copper. Noble materials, they benefit from very high intrinsic value, are resistant, and can be used with a wide variety of finishes (such as oxidation, flaming, brushing) that significantly modify their aesthetic while leaving the virtues of the material unchanged. For example, at De Castelli we have twenty-four different finishes available in the catalogue for copper alone, to which various processes can then be applied.” The most recent of the company’s collections, Copper at Home, created to explore the material’s antibacterial properties, includes Alpha by Martinelli Venezia, a small modular container table with a rhomboidal base, and a natural copper skin processed using the DeErosion controlled-erosion technique.”

Federica Biasi, Mingardo’s Art Director, defines metal as “a simple material, one that can span the simplest and most complex processes. Always noble and rich, this makes it very flexible, including in cost terms. It is more complicated to use in single-material versions, as we have always done at Mingardo; we are seeking to ’soften’ the products with other materials, while maintaining our focus on processing.” Founded as the Carpenteria Metallica Mingardo in Monselice (Padua) in 1970, this year the company took part in the Flame for Research project at Milan Design Week, when a collection of candelabra created by ten designers was auctioned off; the proceeds went to the Istituto Mario Negri.