IDE TO PUGLIA. ︎
CERAMIC & FOOD ROUTE
INTERNATIONAL DESIGN EXPEDITIONS
www.international-design-expeditions.com
BOTTEGA VESTITA
FASANO CERAMICHE CNF
With Mathilde Bretillot ( Founder & Creative Director)
Pierangelo Caramia (Puglia & Basilicata expedition)
Jill Silverman van Coenegrachts (Strategic Advisor)
Marc Bretillot (Food Designer)
With the Support of Fondation Martell and Politecnico di Bari
DESIGNERS: Marta Bakowski / Lili Gayman/ Sarngsan Na Soontorn
Animation: Studio Plastac
CHECK THE ONLINE BOOK HERE
EN︎ IDE is a journey that invites to a work of translation and pushes the designers as well as the craftsmen out of their comfort zone while challenging their established methodology and creative reflexes. This project came as a moment of intense freedom in which most of the ingredients were gathered to allow a fully immersive, collective and cultural experience. Amongst many other images, Puglia could be defined by its archaic landscapesmade of old tortuous olive trees covering the infinite red lands divided by irregular drystone walls and punctuated by folk, lime-covered Trulli constructions. Its identity is also strongly rooted in its local products and cuisine, wonderful in its rusticity, simplicity and honesty. In this region, what could be perceived as rudimentary is in fact a fantastic demonstration of authenticity. Puglia is a place stripped off from the superfluous, an invitation to go back to what is essential. It is that notion of ‘primitiveness’, that I understood as something that is ‘at its origin’; something that speaks about what is ‘elementary’, ‘positively naïve’ and ‘unsophisticated’ that nourished my research and constructed my design response during the entire expedition. Our experience in Puglia took the practice further, as the time between the thinking and the making was drastically reduced. We hardly made any drawings or heavy conceptualization, as we started working straight from very primitive sketches to clay prototypes, letting the hand of the craftsmen follow uncertain silhouettes. But this is where I think the beauty of this experience lies: in letting the intuition do the work and the hands do the thinking; in letting the ball of clay raise before your eyes, under thepressure of the craftsman’s fingers, and allow yourself to say stop when the shape just feels right. In the end, the format that IDE took encouraged us to listen to our deepest instincts,leading to a series of objects that will remain as they were left: ‘straight from theoven’, unpolished and honest.