Workbench

Presented at the Dutch Design Week, Workbench by Alberto Fabbian and Paola Amabile is the result of the experimental collaboration between two traditional artisan realities as wicker and clay.

Design and ceramics renew a shopping center

FMG Fabbrica Marmi and architect Paolo Gianfrancesco, of THG Arkitektar Studio, have designed the restyling of the third floor of Reykjavik's largest shopping center. Ceramic, the central element of the project, covers floors, walls and furniture with versatile solutions and distinctive character.

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Around the table we can discuss, confront each other, share thoughts and ideas: Workbench is a table where materials processing methods are the exchanged words.

Workbench is the result of a collaboration between two traditional artisan realities as wicker and clay. Through an experimental research approach, the project reinterprets feelings and technical possibilities of both materials combined together, in order to identify new languages and processes. The project has been developed working in close contact with local craftsmen related to wicker and clay. Wood flexibility and ceramic fragility, the weaving and the dough, the drying cycle and the baking process, all together on the same table, where materials and methods complement one another and the final result is a contamination between two different worlds.

Workbench Tray represents a new phase of Workbench, a deep research project that explores feelings and technical possibilities of wicker and clay combining them together, in order to identify new languages and processes. Entirely handmade with natural materials, Workbench Tray is the result of knowledges and intuitions reached inside different craftsmen workshops. The delicacy of porcelain joins the flexibilty of wicker thanks to a single wire that runs all along the tray, completing naturally its essential shape. A wood base sustains the object highlighting its lightness.

Alberto Fabbian (1981) and Paola Amabile (1985) are two Italian designers based in Northern Italy. They share their interest in creating projects as containers of knowledges through a continuous dialogue with different identities holding human, cultural and territorial values.
They identify their role as responsible explorers by investigating new connections among actors, processes and knowledges. Their purpose is to create positive impacts by transferring contents that can be shared in several forms, whether objects, situations or food for thought. Their projects have been selected during the Milan Design Week and the Dutch Design Week 2013 and featured in many international design publications.

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Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench e Workbench Tray

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench Tray

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench Tray, making of

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench, making of

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench, making of

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench Tray, making of

Alberto Fabbian, Paola Amabile, Workbench e Workbench Tray

Workbench e Workbench Tray
Design: Alberto Fabbian e Paola Amabile
In collaboration with: Ceramiche Vicentine, Distretto della Ceramica, Porcellana e Vetro Artistico di Nove, Antoniazzi & Piovesana
Materials: wicker and clay (Workbench), porcelain, wicker and wood (Workbench Tray)

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