Clay
by Zanellato/Bortotto, 2025
Soft shapes, with sophisticated simplicity, meet the vocation to research on matter to give life to a chair in balance between design and art.
The experimental work started with the Mangiafuoco collection continues in the Clay armchair, the result of the research of Zanellato/Bortotto and Moroso on ceramics and the desire to reproduce an ancient connection by returning to techniques and manufactures now rare. Another primordial matter that, like enameling copper, has a strong connection with fire and is shaped from it in colors and forms.
The surprise is in the back, like a small work of art perfectly set into a textile frame. Handcrafted in the historic ceramic district of Nove (Vicenza), bi- and three-dimensional ceramic slabs enhance this ancient art through the use of precious enamels and lustrous.
The application is new and unexpected, because these products become the backs of upholstered chairs covered with precious fabrics sewn with sartorial care. A formal lightness that, in the harmony of proportions and in the perfect balance between wonder and functionality, offers high comfort. To serve as a pedestal, a linear base in oak or walnut supports the seat making it a suspended volume.
Gallery
Zanellato/Bortotto
After graduating from the IUAV University of Venice and the ECAL in Lausanne, they present “Acqua Alta”, a project dedicated to Venice, at the Salone Satellite in Milan. Since then, research on the relationship between places, the passage of time and the reinterpretation of traditional craft techniques has become their main field of application.
Zanellato/Bortotto’s works have been exhibited in numerous galleries and institutions, such as MAXXI in Rome, the Design Museum of the Triennale in Milan, the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan, Somerset House and The Aram Gallery in London.
