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Home > CANADA > Focus On
THE ART OF MOSAIC: AN ITALIAN BUSINESS
Rome - (Ign) - Designs known and appreciated all over the world, that can justifiably be considered works of art. A series of companies which hold high Italy's standard, whose products have been used to face mosques and are a universally recognised status symbol. This is the sector of Italian artistic mosaics, in which companies successfully combine art and craftsmanship and display turnovers (in which exports play a vital role) which are growing at an exponential rate.
Among the most important companies in the sector is Bisazza from Veneto (www.bisazza.it), led by Piero Bisazza. This is a leading company in the sector, whose turnover jumped from €58m to €87m in the space of four years and in 2005 broke through the threshold of €100m, up 14.4% up on the previous year. Today, Bisazza is a multinational of luxury goods, whose mosaics have become a status symbol, and has created a series of single brand shops (although they look more like art galleries) all over the world: Moscow, New York, Milan, Shanghai, London and Paris. Bisazza (one of their designs can be seen in the photo), whose trademark is protected by copyright, sells in 130 countries worldwide and has 10 branches and thousands of sales points. Recently it was mentioned by Mediobanca - one of the most important merchant banks in Europe - as one of the most dynamic Italian companies, and in the three year period 2006-2008 aims to double the turnover of its foreign branches. The sales of the 10 commercial branches present in the five continents have resulted in an overall turnover of €46.3 million, up 22.3% on the previous year (the branches reported a turnover of €37.8 million in 2004). In particular, those showing the best results were in Australia, with growth of 48%, and in France, which recorded a turnover of €4.1 million, up 33.7% on the previous year. This was followed by the English branch and the one in Spain, with growth of 31.3% and 30.2% respectively. Bisazza products are aimed at the private residential sector, swimming pools, the public sector, hotels and shipping companies, with designs for interiors and exteriors. Bisazza has collaborated with many leading names in art, design and architecture, including Emilio Tadini, Sandro Chia and Marcel Wanders. Today, the company, which has been present since the end of the 1980s in the far and Middle East (where there are many mosques with domes faced in Oro Bisazza Mosaic), in Africa and South America, has increasingly steered towards fashion, using for its compositions a series of tiger and zebra patterns which are part of the lines of designers like Dolce&Gabbana and Dior. The next markets to be approached will be China, India and Russia, where the top end of the market is ready to be seduced by the charm of the Italian brand.
Trend (www.trend-vi.com), meanwhile, was founded by one of the Bisazza brothers, Pino, who left the family company in 1999. Today, Trend has five production companies, three assembly units, four business offices, and a turnover that continues to rise by between 20% and 30% a year (of which exports account for over 80%). It also has 890 employees and 4000 distributors all over the world. In 2004, with the takeover of Le Chianche, the range of materials and products was further extended to include stone and related products. A 17th-century villa next to the Palladian arch of Vicenza, transformed by the architect Alessandro Mendini, houses a showroom and workshop. In February, Trend opened a new showroom in Miami, while in Florida, in Serbling, it started work on a production facility for glass, quartz and granite agglomerates. This investment, worth around 60 million dollars and spread over four years, was aimed at consolidating its presence on the highly strategic US market.
Also Fantini Mosaici (www.fantinimosaici.it) is extremely successful in the Middle East: the company has recently received an order for the interior finishing of the Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi. Fantini was established in 1900, and started out as a family business, but today has become a presence in the five continents: from New York and Miami, and Montreal, to Singapore, Sidney and Tokyo. Prestigious residences, public areas, representation and commercial offices, not to mention the boutiques of internationally important designers, with mosaic, studded and pebbled floors. This is the core business of Fantini, which uses all types of marble for its mosaic tesserae, in addition to enamelled materials, glass and material laminated in gold and silver. Each single piece is profiled by hand, with dimensions which vary according to the detail for which it is destined.
Travisanutto (www.travisanutto.it) from Friuli, meanwhile, was established in 1979, after the experience of its founder, Giovanni, in the United States. The first workshop producing artistic mosaics opened in Spilimbergo. Today, Travisanutto produces both mosaics with paper backing, for domes or where a smooth surface is required, and using direct application, on wood or honeycomb panels, and on glass fibre mesh.. Another company from Friuli - a region which is also home to a school for mosaic craftsmen - is Mosaic Line (www.mosaicline.it), led by Valter Solari. Mosaic Line deals with the design and creation of artistic, decorative and flooring mosaics, but also with faithful reproductions of decorative subjects taken from masterpieces of renaissance, modern and contemporary art. Lastly, Mos Art (www.mosart.it) is a typical craftsman's workshop, which works on the customers' demands: makes products according to the ancient Greek, Roman and Byzantine mosaic tradition. In particular, floor and wall mosaics, modern cartoon mosaics, religious art, furnishing accessories and ornaments.
Italian imagination, Italian taste, Italian design. Artistic mosaics all over the world speak a single language.
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