Gessi - Perspectives

project division
Perspectives

CABERLON CAROPPI

Biography
Interview
Projets

THE DESIGNERS - ARCHIVE
- CABERLON CAROPPI
- ANTONIO IRACI
- IDO CORRADINI

PROFILE

On the strength of 39 projects for international brand hotels and head offices just opened in Beijing, Caberlon Caroppi Studio extends its activity from feasibility studies to master plans, from cost control to concept design, from architecture to interior design through to coordinated image design: from the logo to the uniform. Their projects experiment with new hospitality concepts and focus special attention on emphasizing interior design and details, atmospheres and the emotions generated by scenarios with which guests must interact.

Chiara from Milan and Ermanno from Puglia met on their very first day at Milan Polytechnic University in Milan where both graduated in architecture.

In 2004 the CaberlonCaroppi Hotel&Design firm was founded with the aim of uniting and sharing diverse experiences to create new concepts in hospitality not only directed towards the tourist and businessman but also towards the city and its inhabitants.

The studio carries out consultancy for hotel management companies, service companies.
Real estate development companies, and private clients.
They studio has worked on projects for a number of prestigious international names (hotels chains and resorts) located in the most important Italian cities. The Studio has won several awards for innovative design.

In 2006 they participated at the exhibition BDCI “Brand & Designer China Iniziative”at the fair of China in Shenzen with the most important italian designers.
In 2009 they participated at the exhibition CDIF “China International Design & Art Fair” at the fair of China in Beijing.
In the 2010 head officeshave opened in Beijing.
The architects have kept several university lectures in Tsinghua University Bejing, Domus Academy and Politecnic of Milan.

POINTS OF VIEW

Our research is focused on living the moment of the architecture, the place, the event, the step. “Designing time” is an interesting and exciting challenge, especially if lived through the eyes of the user. We aim to give our client and its customers the role of an actor, not that of a spectator. Hotels, restaurants, shops, showrooms, stands, cinemas are just a few of the places where we regularly encounter “carpe diem” but does not always leave us with a trace, a memory.

What we try to achieve in our projects is to create an atmosphere, an emotion, to leave a sign of passage: a memory. Our activity focuses on these spaces: furnishings, lighting, materials and colours are the basis for our research. We work to ensure that our final spectators perceive and interact with the space that we have built for them as they pass through.
Experience, specialisation and professionalism are the essential ingredients for good work.

We believe that in our sector the most important aspect for a hotel project is to start from the "genius loci": from the relationship with the local area, local traditions and history. In an effort to identify the social-cultural, architectural, language and customs features that characterise a place, an environment or a city.

Our role as a projects Studio must not only focus on the interior but we must also provide our client with complete support: to create a product that ensures a profitable investment. Making a mistake in one bathroom in a hotel project may also mean replicating the same error in 300.

When we project a new hotel we choose Gessi for the bathrooms because it has always been recognized as the epitome of Italian style and design.
The relationship we have with the company's people, their flexibility and availability have allowed through time to build an effective partnership method that starts from an analysis of the needs and the ability to know how to meet them; not only from the economic point of view but also and above all from the design point of view. This adds to the closeness of Gessi designs to our style.
Gessi is a guarantee for us, an absolutely reliable partner with whom we will always be willing to work.

PROFILE

Antonio Iraci, architect largely in demand in Italy and abroad, was born at Misterbianco, a few kilometers away from Catania, on April 11 1961. He graduated at the Architecture faculty of Reggio Calabria in 1988, with highest honors. After graduation, in 1989 he founded studio Archline to open an architecture lab using the projects as a field for research and experimentation.
Archiline, with a young team for the post part, soon became a cutting edge design practice that brought the entire Eastern Sicily on the international scene in the architectonic field.
The operating field covers private residential, commercial, industrial and contract, accommodation facilities and industrial design, managing the whole creation process, from project to construction site.
During its extensive professional activity, creating small and large scale architectures, all concept choices moved towards a strong figurative project deviation to the as is and this way lead the experimentation of a new aesthetic conception through the signs of pure minimalism.
The architect’s portfolio includes projects and applications of all kinds, from lounge bars to showroom, to private homes, from preschools to Catania’s Hard Rock Cafè.
One of Iraci’s outstanding accomplishments was working with other professionals, such as the longtime collaboration with great US architect Richard Meier, who influenced his way of interpreting his work.
Through the years Iraci’s personal concept philosophy became focused on the quality of space, where lightness, sobriety, accurate research on details, non invasive technological solutions, horizontal and vertical geometric incorporation become essential characteristics. Architecture is a delicate puzzle where each element is crucial and connected to others to define the whole.
At his home at Misterbianco, where Iraci chose to return to flee the chaos of towns like Catania and Palermo, where his architect practices, he found the perfect harmony of his conceptual approach: fusion between Arab and Sicilian living culture around an internal patio with modernity in volumes at play, light, incorporation of inside and outside, of vertical and horizontal spaces, large use of lava stone but also of new technologies, emphasis on natural light, reflected, multiplied, absorbed by dark surfaces; changing spaces, versatile, linear; unbelievably light.
Traditional Mediterranean architecture totally reviewed to get the innovative result that can be located in Misterbianco or Miami as well.

POINTS OF VIEW

In the life and creations of Antonio Iraci, all is evolving, nothing is static, and nothing is heavy.
“We practice Architecture with a capital A – said the architect – we design, build, dirty our hands in the construction site. I don’t like who does only interior design for example, of just gardens. I do everything, I like everything. I designed sinks, furnishings, hotels, I created a sailing boat from scratch, using, apart from fiberglass, only materials never used before and finding always new solutions”. For Iraci architecture is building, each work is a challenge, each challenge enriching and transforming.
Creativity, genius, innovation, but not intemperance. The groundwork of invention is solid and experimented with calculation and seriousness, studying space and customer.
“My attention for details is almost maniacal, I don’t stand improvisation and I refuse to consider small things less important than big ones” For Iraci details are not simple details, since on them is based and perceived the difference.
Author of a few extraordinary interventions on historical buildings of Catania, Iraci believes that beauty should always be protected, if it is really beautiful, it should have a sense, an order. “If an ancient building is actually ugly, it’s better to bring it down and remake it – said the architect – historical centers should regain rigor, cleanness, as well”.
His passion for marathon, a sport requiring dedication, constant daily exercise and that allows controlling the potentialities of the body and of the mind, tells a lot about the man and the architect.
“It has not always been easy” - said Antonio - "the marathon taught me regularity, never giving up, even facing the most hard challenges. Insist, results will be there. It happened with Archlinea as well. Not many would have believed in such a pioneering architecture in Sicily, but as a marathoner I knew that strength together with a real passion always brings results”.
Concerning one of the last works in Belgrade, here there is an altogether expression of Made in Italy. “The idea of a Made in Italy architecture is important for those who try to do their work at best and with passion - said Iraci – like working with companies that give you the full display of the product, without shadows”. Iraci talks of Gessi, the company he visited and its staff: “Gessi has intrinsically an architectonic value and a design value, a greatly conceived water production machine. Designing a home– the architect goes on – especially in the bathroom, which is the wellness place regardless of any boundaries, cannot go without quality and sustainability”.

PROFILE

Ido Corradini expresses his design conception and his signature style through projects which are characterized by formal neatness, space dilatation and virtual continuity of exterior architectural lines and interiors.
All these concepts show through the balance between volumes and light both in residential projects and exhibit design and add a stimulating and suggestive content to them.
Graduated at The Art Institute of Reggio Emilia, starting from the 80s Ido Corradini devoted himself entirely to interior design while gaining experience in shop and show-room design, mainly focusing on wellness projects.

Starting from 1990 his activity tended towards exhibit design by designing display systems for sanitary ware and materials for architecture and construction, as well as show rooms for decorative fixtures and plumbing. Today he stands as a well acknowledged specialist in this sector.