Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Formafantasma (Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin) strike back and this time it is tastier than ever! Their Baked project is the result of a commission for an exhibition presented during Dutch Design Week 2009, on the theme “Getting Lost” at the 4 Apostelen church in Eindhoven.. That’s why they followed their intuition and curiosity without aiming a clear result and it seems that it functioned perfectly.
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
They give us all the details: “While we were working on our thesis (a collection of vases), we decided to make some tryout to check the proportions of a form we had designed. Not having something else we mixed different ingredients we had in our kitchen like flower, salt, coffee and channel to simulate earthenware colour. We later baked the result in our oven. What a beautiful result! A material better than bio-plastic, easy to make. After that night the baked-bowl remained forgotten in our kitchen…Later on, while we were in Sicily to research on folklore for our thesis, we discovered a folk event in Salemi where bread is used as decoration for its sculptural quality and its symbolic value (Catholicism, sharing…).The invitation to be part to the exhibition “Getting lost”, its topic and the venue (a church), somehow suggested us to continue working with this material, waiting to be placed in a better context”.
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Moreover, it is worth mentioning that Baked is a totally natural and sustainable project:
- colors are obtained filtering and boiling different natural products such as paprika, spinach, blueberries, coffee etc.
- it needs low-temperature baking (50-70 degree)
- it is totally biodegradable
- the material doesn’t corrupt because of the use of spices and salt as natural preservative.
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Formafantasma have it clear that they like the idea to play with the symmetry between kitchen and workshop. Materials become ingredients, the kiln becomes an oven, plaster moulds substitute cake moulds and so on. The vessels are refined with elastic belts that allow the user to arrange bakery products as a new form of décor. One way or another, Formafantasma consider Baked as a work in progress.
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Experimenting with the material they had to face all the same problematic that also ceramic has, such as shrinking and deformations during the baking, and difficulties to find the right baking temperature for each color-ingredient. At the moment they are still experimenting with the material that sooner or later from “raff clay” will become precious porcelain! They conclude:”Baked questions the role of materials in design.
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
We feel and believe that every material has a quality: we do not like prejudice towards materials”. Yatzer, always hungry for surprises, is thinking seriously of changing eating habits and put Formafantasma definitely in its daily diet! We hope the same for you too…
Image Courtesy of Formafantasma
