Tiziana Scaciga, founder of the Italian Recycled Stone Company, tells of the cute Adélie Penguins of the Antarctic: the male gives the female a stone as a pre-nuptial gift. „It serves to build the nest and thus is of special value to the species“. From the point of view of her company, which works with waste from natural stone production, the question is: how can one give waste a new value?
Design is the pivotal point in value assessment of the initial material. Ghigos Ideas Studio is the design partner for this reason.
We start with non-design as in the case of the cutting board far top: here the slab was left untouched except the polishing of the surface.
Very important: the play on shapes of the initial material: lack of prejudice in design opens all the possibilities which only a piece of waste can give.
Surprising things also happen, when designers give manufacturing marks a new meaning.
But what if such a vase was to fall off the table and a piece chipped off?
So what? In the case of these pieces so called beauty no-longer plays a role, each new blemish may be added value, e.g. by calling to memory the day the vase fell off the table.
Household items thus store memories just as do vacation photos. And they attain a new level of quality hitherto reserved for jewelry: they can be a witness to life with all its ups and downs.
This is also where objects used for arrangements get their special value. Magniloquently stated: such pieces call forth the play on life.
Social reconcilability and regional reference are two further distinguishing factors. Only local material is used originating from within close proximity of the company’s headquarters in Val d’Ossola-Valley. The products are hand-made. Whenever possible, physically or mentally challenged people are integrated in the production and packaging process.
This sounds like a chapter out of the textbook on the ecology movement. And, indeed, Tiziana Scaciga spent some years in communication with non-profit enterprises.
Her family entertains the Moro Stone Company in Val d’Ossola in Piedmont, whose focus is on interior décor and whose claim to fame is the caption „Il Cuore della Pietra“ (the heart of stone).
Of course the ideological base is shielded by a very real marketing strategy: all pieces are produced in strictly limited numbers and come with a certificate of authenticity.
The story on the Adélie penguins is repeated in the company’s „Love Stones“ : at the presentation at the Fuorisalone in Milan in April, visitors were encouraged to take along a piece of the stone and give it to someone close as proof of „an authentic and intense choice” according to the press documentation.
In one of our next editions we will report on the result of the cooperation between Recycled Stone and artist Matthew Broussard, who also presented his work in Milan.
Photos: Simone Marcolin
(23.06.2015, USA: 06.23.2015)